New Beginnigs
by Cpt Fox McCloud
Summary: An unstoppable army invades from outside the Lylat system. Takes place three months after SFA, two months after Fox and Krystal's marriage. Rated R for extreme violence, foul language, and mature sexual content.
1. First Bloodshed

At the edge of the Lylat system a metal hull cut through the starry void.

Captain Jake Stevens paced across the command catwalk situated just in front of the bridge view port. His job was not glorious nor was it exciting. He'd been assigned to patrolling this sector at the edge of the years ago, just after one of the wars with the Venomians. He remembered Commander Shepard's words as if it was yesterday.

_I don't understand why I'm here sir._

_Don't you, well then let me make it clear to you, in war it is acceptable to spend lives but it is not acceptable to waste lives let alone three hundred lives. You ignored the information provided to you by Cornerian command and took your frigate to Sector Y to engage those Venomian ships rather than wait for reinforcements, then when you found an enemy armada waiting for you instead of a few scouts you attempted a micro jump in a nebula when you could of easily outran the warships and left the nebula before retreating. If you had chosen more wisely three hundred men would never have died. As of now you are being reassigned to patrol sector 492 at the edge of known space. You have a week before you must report to orbital dock 57 at 0800 hours to take command of the frigate Redemption to leave immediately. _

Stevens remembered standing up and shouting.

_You can't do this to me!_

He remembered Shepard standing up and slamming him to a wall.

Your error was so enormous that regulations would have me send you to a court martial, but I've always believed in second chances. If you want to be court marshaled than by all means I'll set it up for you but this way you will have a chance for redemption.

Stevens brought his hand to his face and pushed the memory back down. Suddenly he was jerked out of his meditation when another ship suddenly appeared in front of the view port. Roughly triangle shaped it was at least twice the size of his own ship a battle cruiser maybe. Within seconds fighters dumped from its hangers and weapons flashed and with horror he realized that it was hostile. There was shouting and confusion on the bridge as his relatively inexperienced crew tried to bring the ship to battle stations, but it was too late. Huge blue energy beams lanced through space and stabbed into the Redemption. For a few seconds the shields held, than they collapsed and the bolts slammed into the hull. Out the view port he could see blue energy currents playing across the hull. Computer screens went blank or burst into static and a technician screamed as his computer screens exploded in his face, showering him with glass fragments and electricity.

"Shit, sir they've hit us with Ion cannons we've lost all systems except life support, lights, door control, and all minor subsystems!"

"Sir, we have incoming boarding craft!"

Stevens's mind was raced, along with his pulse, he couldn't shoot back, he couldn't call for help, and he couldn't run, and the enemy was about to board.

" Damn it deploy all fire teams, seal off all major airlocks and close blast doors in any areas we don't need!"

Sergeant Moody flew out of his bunk as deafening alarms suddenly started wailing and a message came over the intercom.

"Attention all personnel, the ship is disabled, internal combat imminent, report to your assigned battle stations immediately, this is not a drill!"

_This can't be happening._ Moody thought as he zipped up his coveralls, strapped on his flak vest, donned his helmet, then grabbed and loaded his assault rifle. He and his men charged out of the bunkroom, grabbing spare ammo on their way out.

They charged past rapidly closing blast doors and ran through various corridors, cutting through the number five mess hall before arriving at the closed blast doors that sealed of Airlock 59.

"Alright men we don't know what the hell is gonna come through those doors but it'll try to kill you."

He crouched behind one of the overturned tables they'd dragged in from the mess room and pulled the charging lever on his weapon.

There was a loud clanking as something hit the hull and a grinding sound as it breached the airlock, then a faint red light appeared in the corner of the blast door and slowly began to work it's way around until there was a red circle covering most of the door.

"Get down!"

The door exploded, showering them in hot fragments and filling the room with smoke. Moody peaked out from behind cover and pulled the trigger as more than a dozen armed soldiers swarmed into the room. His shoot caught a coyote in the face and his gun fired a burst into the ceiling as he went down. Then the room was full of bullets and blaster bolts, another attacker was hit, and another, and another, but then his own men began to die. Banner took a burst to the chest, Johnson got hit in the head, Anders took a shot to the stomach. More enemies came through the jagged hole in the door, these ones held arm mounted energy shields in front of themselves, shielding the wave of troops behind them.

"Fall back!"

Moody shouted before turning and sprinting for the door. He dove and rolled into the mess hall as half a dozen of his men followed. The last two were hit in the back and collapsed to the deck in pools of their own blood. Moody dove behind a table as a burst of blaster bolts tore threw another soldiers chest and hurled him against the wall. He stood up and charged across the room holding down the trigger until the clip emptied, before he felt a burst of pain, like a hot razor, tear through his stomach. His vision blurred as he fell to the deck, and saw a lupine soldier standing over him. The soldier aimed his weapon at his face and pulled the trigger.

It had taken thirty minutes for the enemy to overrun the ship.

_This can't be happening, this can't be happening._

Stevens thought as he drew his sidearm and crouched behind a console. The red line had almost burned a complete circle in the blast doors that sealed off the bridge. The rest of the bridge crew was crouched behind various consoles, side arms held in trembling hands as they covered the entrance. The door exploded and soldiers charged in.

"Eat this you bastards!"

Stevens shouted as he held down the trigger, he had never been a very good shot but at this range even he couldn't miss. He had the satisfaction of see his bullets tear through the face of a feline soldier, one tearing through his left eye, the other entering his mouth and exploding out the back of his neck, showering the soldier behind him in blood. Suddenly he felt a burst of pain in his torso as he was hit. He cried out as the force of the hit threw him against the view port. His vision swam and the last thing he saw was one of the soldiers aim a blaster rifle at him.

"Consider yourself a prisoner of the Brotherhood."


	2. Rising Storm

Two Arwings approached the Great Fox as it lazily orbited Corneria. Fox skillfully brought his fighter into the hanger and touched down, a few moments later Krystal followed suit.

_This place needs a new paint job._

Fox thought as he jumped out of his Arwing and walked over to Krystal. A moment later his wife climbed out, clad in a tight fitting sky blue jump suit that matched her fur. They had been happily married for several months now. Together they walked to the lift and ascended into the bowels of the ship. The double doors slid open with a feint hiss as they entered the bridge. As usually Peppy was asleep at his station, Slippy was tinkering with an odd looking device, and Falco was leaning back in his chair with his feet on the console.

"Fox your back, how did the meeting go." Slippy called, his annoying squeaky voice so high pitched it almost bothered the vulpine's sensitive ears.

"Not really that boring, though I'm not sure why General Pepper wanted us to attend so badly. All they really discussed is beefing up the military again, sending another cleanup crew to Zoness, which of course is pointless, and how a solid alliance with Venom has been secured now that General Polovschy is in charge and a senate has been set up."

Fox sat down in the captain's chair, as Krystal sat down at the newly installed fourth station.

"Alright guys and girls, here's the plan, they said that Bill's squadron would be on leave in three days, and knowing him he'll be glad to duel with us, until then we all have three days to do what ever we want."

Meanwhile, a small fleet of warships hovered at the edge of the Lylat System. Colonel Bromley's strode through the large room, which was full of strange machines, technicians, and scientists.

"Colonel."

Bromley turned to see an artic fox walking toward him stop and salute.

"At ease Lieutenant, what do you have for me Miles?"

"Sir, the capture of the enemy vessel was achieved with relatively minimal casualties, and we managed to capture, much of their technology, and took almost a hundred prisoners including the ship's Captain."

This came as no surprise to Bromley except that the Captain had allowed himself to be taken alive.

"Have the scientist been able to analyze this stuff yet."

"Yes sir, their technology appears to be designed along the same principles as our own and is nearly identical."

"That's interesting."

A burly Sergeant walked hurried up to him.

"Sir, your the meeting is about to begin."

"Will have to discuss this later Miles, lead on Sergeant."

The meeting chamber was large, circular, and dimly lit. It appeared that the meeting had begun early as Bromley heard General Osborn arguing with Admiral Lovell.

_This is gonna be ugly._

Bromley thought as he sat down, though he wasn't sure why it would be, after all everything was on schedule and going as planned.

"Gentlemen!"

All conversations abruptly ceased as every stood and saluted. It was always interesting how when Grand Admiral Stanford spoke everyone listened.

"The meeting has now come to order, the topic, the invasion. The enemy frigate has been captured without incident, and its crew is being interrogated as we speak. The political and scientific junkies are being more generous with their information. They are looking for a planet called Dinosaur Planet, a planet rumored to be rich with a substance of great power. This brings us to the next topic, the navicomputer of the frigate was captured almost intact, though the crew was able to wipe a small amount data from the computer, our scientists have been able to fill in most of the gaps. Using this data we have been able to not only locate this Dinosaur Planet, but also have located many planets that are rich with resources. This brings us to our last topic, the operations. Our fleet will be split into three groups, the first will move against Dinosaur Planet, the second will move against a resource rich volcanic planet called Macbeth, and the third will attack another highly volcanic planet known as Venom. See your local mission command officer for further details."

General Osborn raised a hand.

"What of the new weapons the scientists have promised."

Stanford turned to face him.

"Don't worry General, your army will get its new toys, but they will not be ready for full deployment for another week."

Several other officers raised their hands, but Stanford suddenly stood and spoke.

"This meeting is adjourned, now go, you all have a lot of preparations to make.


	3. The War Begins

Fox entered the lab, followed by Krystal and Falco, Slippy. It was a medium sized room filled with computers and machinery, with various odds and ends laying strewn about the place. 

"I think you guys you be impressed with some of the new gear I've developed."

  
Slippy said in his annoyingly squeaky voice. He grabbed a handful a box full of God only knows what, turned and headed back toward the door. The two Fox, Krystal, and Falco followed Slippy to the gym, where they found various pieces of equipment waiting for them.

_This oughta be good. _Fox thought as they followed Slippy to a group of crates laying in the corner.

Colonel Bromley walked down the rows of fighters, Wraiths. They were wedge shaped with a pair of sleek wings thrusting out from their sides, they had a cockpit mounted in about mid-ship, a single fin thrusting up directly behind the cockpit, and powerful engines mounted at the rear. They sported a pair of wing mounted laser cannons, a powerful nose mounted plasma cannon, and a pair of side mounted missile launchers. They were as fast and agile as they looked. 

"They all have been inspected and are ready for combat sir."

"Very good corporal."

Bromley left the mechanic to his work and headed for they ready room, where he would receive further details on the mission. As he strode past the lounge Miles joined him, and fell in wordlessly with his lupine superior. He didn't know very many people as well as he did Miles, they'd been friends since high school. There had been only one other person he'd known so well, if not a little deeper, his wife. He remembered her so clearly, a kit fox with sandy fur, large ears, a soft bushy tail, green eyes, and a nice figure. She had been a flight officer too, her command had been the 102nd elite fighter squadron, until that day. Admiral Lovell had sent an armada to take the Dertrillion System, and she had been leading the fighter groups. The Admiral had received intelligence warning him that the Dertrillion navy was expecting them and had set up a few surprises for them. But he had ignored them, saying that even in the unlikely event that those incompetents knew they were coming their fighters and warships would be no match and would be easily defeated. 

He'd been wrong. When the fleet arrived at the edge of the system they'd found a minefield waiting for them. The surviving fighters and few capitol ships that hadn't been damaged, were met with no less than twenty frigate and light cruiser analogs, as well as hundreds of fighters. They never had a chance. Ever since than he'd questioned officers like Lovell, and sometimes he wondered what it was the politicians and the scientists were up to. Ties with the military, the scientists, and the politicians had never been the best, especially lately. 

He reached the briefing room and the doors slid open, and slid closed behind him. Various squad leaders sat in the circular rows of seats arranged around a holo projector in the center of the room. He noticed several flight officers he knew, as well as Captain Sydney. She was a nicely built cheetah, Mile's "friend". The lights dimmed and the holo projector pulsed to life. Bromley and Miles hurried into a pair of seats as Lieutenant Sanders stepped up to the center of the room. Sanders was one of those Intelligence geeks, who while lightly built Bromley had to admit knew his stuff.

"Ladies and gentleman, we will revert to realspace at Dinosaur Planet in one hour, so hopefully you have all finished studying your individual mission orders. Our fleet will take up a blockade position around the planet and your fighters are to deploy as soon as he hit realspace. Once any orbital opposition is cleared we will we send ground forces and air support into the planets atmosphere, and that is were you come in. While are ground forces engage the planets ground army you will attack these targets."

A series of satellite images appeared on the screen, they looked like military camps. 

"You will neutralize all fixed enemy positions but you are NOT to harm these targets. "

A new series of pictures appeared. They looked like large stone like structures, one surrounded by beaches, another by lava, a third floated in the sky, and the last one appeared to be some sort of desert. 

"That is all, good hunting."

The lights came back on and the pilots filed out of the room.

Sergeant Nixon had always hated his job. Sitting in a command center all day, watching screens displaying information from dozens of probes and the listening outposts sensor dishes. Nothing had ever happened, nothing probably ever would happen. A sudden alarm klaxon nearly sent him flying out of his seat. He sat up in his seat and directed his attention to the screens showing data from probe 049. It showed multiple gravity distortions pacing through that sector. He leaned forward in his seat and adjusted a few controls, bringing up a series of rough outlines, radiation imaging. It showed a large group of blurs surrounded by the dazzling light show that was hyperspace, he adjusted the controls again. The silhouettes blurred and resolved into sleek warships of designs that didn't match anything in his database.

"Oh my God." 

Nixon furiously punched a series of buttons, bringing up a comm. feed to Corneria.


	4. The Fall of Dinosaur Planet

An armada of ships of all shapes and sizes silently orbited Corneria, some boxy, some organic looking, others sleek and knife-like. On closer inspection however it did not appear silent at all, instead it was barely organized chaos. Several hundred small ships buzzed around the warships, carriers and troopships. Shuttles, troop transports, freighters, starfighters, and maintenance craft, swarming around the larger ships bringing troops and equipment to the ships, or personnel who had been on shore leave. Freighters scurried back and forth from the planet bringing up supplies and parts, maintenance craft made last minute checks to make sure the ships were ready. But the chaos was beginning to die down, General Pepper noticed as he stared out the bridge view port. He turned to Captain Whitcomb.

"How long until we're ready to leave, we've wasted too much time already."

"About another hour sir. All maintenance checks are complete; supply runs should be completed in less than ten minutes, and all crew and ops personnel are on board. Also ninety-five percent of the troops and equipment are on board, but are only sixty-five percent secured."

General Pepper pondered this for a minute.

"That's still too long. Once all supplies and troops are on board tell all fighters to dock and all freighters and transports to clear the area."

Whitcomb stiffened

"Yes sir."

He didn't like this one bit, the General had a point but you couldn't just rush into battle. You had to plan; you had to get a reconnaissance. You had to be well supplied and equipped especially when dealing with a new and unknown adversary. But General Pepper had fought many wars, so it wasn't his place to question the General.   
  
He watched as the technicians around him hurried about, furiously typing commands at their stations, giving or taking orders, and otherwise hurrying to get the ship ready in time. Whitcomb turned to the display screen showing the hangers. One screen showed a fighter bay, with lines of Broadsword fighters with fuel or maintenance lines attached to their hulls and ladders attached to their cockpits. Broadswords were sleek and deadly, greatly resembling Arings but with their hulls more slender and knife-like. They incorporated the same swing-back wing design as the Arwings and had two dorsal mounted near the cockpit, much like an Arwing except that they were a little more angled. They were not quite as fast as Arwings but just as agile. They did however, have more firepower with each one packing four wing mounted laser cannons, two mounted at the base of the ventral fins, and two at the base of the dorsal fins. They also had a pair of nose-mounted bomb/missile launchers. Another squadron fighters entering the docking bay brought him out of his reverie as he turned to one of the drop ship bays. He could see tanks entering drop ships, looking very similar to the earlier Landmaster but without the two fins, and with larger turrets. They looked much more rugged and were far superior to their predecessor. There were also rugged, wheeled vehicles and APC's entering the ships, along with various other pieces of equipment. Platoons of troops marched up into slightly smaller and sleeker drop ships, carrying all manner of weapons and equipment. 

A comm. beeped, informing the bridge that all fighters were docked, all launch bay doors closed, and all transports clear of the fleet.

"Ensign plot a course to Dinosaur Planet and relay the coordinates to all other ships." 

"Yes sir."

A few moments later, coordinates streamed onto one of the main view screens signaling the completion of the task. 

"Jump to hyperspace in three, two, one, engage."

It was an impressive site as the ship rocketed forward, dazzling lights appeared and flickered, as the ship tore through the dimensional barrier and entered hyperspace, the rest of the fleet right behind them, leaving Corneria far behind.

Krystal adjusted the integrated display goggles as she raised her staff. A small targeting sight appeared on her display along with targeting data. She aimed the sight over one of the targets at the other side of the gym and fired a three shot burst of small fireballs. The target shattered and the fragments melted. She adjusted to infrared imaging aimed, and blew apart the next target in line. She removed the goggles and looked across the gym to where Fox was taking his new energy sword through a complex series of slashes, thrusts and combos. She watched as it cleaved a thick metal target in two. Slippy pressed a button and a slender dueling droid whirred to life, wielding a dull sword, it began to fence with Fox. Further down the gym Falco was "showing his bravery" by testing the personal shield generator, a small boxy device that could be attached to belts or clothing. He stood near the wall while a multi-barreled tripod mounted gun aimed at him. The gun fired a blaster bolt and the force knocked Falco against the wall. A shimmering energy field was now visible surrounding him. It shimmered for a moment before fading from view again. The gun rotated, bringing another barrel to bear on the avian. It fired three small needle shaped shards of some sort of crystal. The shards hit the shield and exploded but did no damage. Next the gun fired a burst of metal bullets, all of which pinged off the shield. Finally the gun's camera shut down and it slumped a little on its tripod. 

"See nothing to it."

Despite his confident attitude he seemed a bit rattled and a feint smell of sweat reached Krystal's nose. Fox powered down his energy sword and walked over to Slippy. 

"Nice sword. So Rob says that Bill hasn't contacted us yet."

"That's right Fox, he's three hours late and hasn't sent any transmissions to tell us he'd be late." 

Fox rubbed his hand on his chin.

"Hmmm, if they're not here yet then they're probably not coming. We'd better head back to Corneria and find out what's up."

A few minutes later the band of mercenaries were on the bridge.

"Peppy plot us a course to Corneria…. Peppy!"

Peppy lurched half up out of his seat were he had dozed off.

"Right Fox."

As he was entering in the coordinates a light blinked showing an incoming transmission. Slippy hit the play button and a terse male voice came over the bridge speaker.

"Attention this is Captain Whitcomb of the cruiser Defender, all ships within seven light years of Dinosaur Planet are to converge on the planet immediately, I repeat, all ships within seven light years of Dinosaur Planet are to converge on the planet immediately."

"What the hell."

Fox and Falco both said in unison.

"Slippy how long would it take us to reach Dinosaur Planet."

"I'd say about thirty minutes Fox."

"Good, Peppy plot us a course to Dinosaur Planet."

"Course plotted Fox, entering hyperspace in five, four, three, two, one."

The stars outside the view port turned to white lines and space blurred as the Great Fox jumped to hyperspace.

Colonel Bromley brought his Wraith in for another strafing run, his lasers vaporizing half a dozen of those short, armored dinosaurs that seemed to make up most of the enemies army. They used mostly swords, maces, axes, and crossbows, but a few had been seen throwing large, explosive, metal barrels at Brotherhood forces. The enemy also had armored triceratopses and pterodactyls, as well as modern jet bikes and artillery cannons. He brought his fighter around again and this time fired his plasma cannon, killing a triceratops. In the distance he could see Brotherhood tanks, APC's, LAV's, and infantry slaughtering a large portion of the dinosaur army. A swarm of drop ships flew by; their side doors open, spewing legions of paratroopers and jump jet troopers until the sky was full of them. 

"Heads up Alpha group, watch those paratroopers."

"Colonel Bromley, this is Commander Stevens, we need you to take down those enemy artillery batteries at coordinates zero-three-seven."

"Yes sir, you heard him boys."

Bromley's squadron changed course and came screaming in at high speed over the enemy position. Bromley fired two bombs, and watched as they streaked out and shattered three squat artillery turrets. Another flurry of explosions followed as his wing mates launched their own bombs. They came around again and made another pass with lasers and plasma cannons, just to make sure. Bromley saw another squadron coming to help, this one made up of Banshee atmospheric gun ships. Banshees had a forward mounted cockpit, a long slender fuselage that ended in a three finned "tail", and a pair of hover jets mounted midship, one on the left side and one on the right side. They packed heavy machine guns and powerful rocket pods. Suddenly a flak shell exploded in the middle of the squadron and one Banshee went down, the rest scattered as a hail of flak shells filled the sky with deadly artificial clouds.

"This is Alpha three, I'm hit, aaaaggghhhh!"

Bromely's own squadron scattered. In the confusion two Banshees formed up on him and together they made a strafing run on a group of hidden flak guns. Turrets shattered, and bodies were ripped apart as a hail of rockets exploded in their midst. Bromley came up to find his squadron regrouping, but the flak had stopped. He looked around; all over the battle appeared to be winding down. Dinosaur planet was theirs. Suddenly a voice came over the speaker.

"Attention all units, an unknown, hostile fleet has just dropped out of hyperspace, stay alert."

Bromley keyed the comm.

"Alright Alpha group, let's give em a hand."

Bromley and his squadron turned and headed for orbit to join the space battle.


	5. First Strike

Fox dashed out of the lift and ran to his Arwing, Falco and Krystal right behind him.  Slippy's voice came over the intercom.

"One minute to arrival."

Fox climbed the ladder in one step and jumped into the cockpit. Even before he hit the seat his hands were flying over the controls, screens came to life and control panels lit up. He closed the canopy and warmed up the engine.  The hanger filled with a high pitched whining as the trio of Arwings powered up their engines. 

"Ten seconds, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one, reverting to realspace. 

Hydraulics whirred as the massive hangers doors opened, and the containment field hummed to life.  Fox paused for a moment to observe the area before he hurled himself into it. In the distance Dinosaur Planet hung in the void, just as it had been during his mission to it about a year ago. But this time a hoard of large warships floated in the void around it, pummeling each other, while all manner of smaller ships swarmed around them. The Arwings rose from the deck and their landing gear retracted, then in unison Fox, Krystal, and Falco ignited their engines and screamed out of the docking bay and towards the battle. Fox keyed his comm. to Cornerian battle frequencies.

"This is Fox McCloud of the Starfox team, if you copy please send orders."

"This is Captain Whitcomb of the cruiser Defender, good to see you Starfox team, we have the situation under control up here, you'll do the most good down on the planet, very few of our fighters have been able to make it through the blockade and our ground forces are pinned down, and need air support."

"Yes sir, Starfox out. You heard him guys we've got to break through that blockade."

"Woohooo, just like the trip to Aquas." Falco shouted.

The trio of Arwings accelerated to full speed and dove into the battle, dodging green, red and blue energy blasts, blazing past dogfights and dodging capitol ships. Fox keyed his comm.

"Heads up Falco, you've picked up a bogey."

"I see him Fox, you've got one too."

_Shit. _He dodged left as a flurry of red laser blasts shot by. Fox brought his Arwing into a hard left turn and then a quick dive, shaking the fighter off his tail long enough to come up on Falco. He was trying furiously to shake the fighter, no make that two fighters on his tail. Fox dropped in and squeezed the trigger, putting a burst of emerald laser fire into the lead starfighter, the second one dove to the left, executed a high gee turn, and came right at Fox. He shield rolled to the left and hit the brakes. The fighter screamed by and then burst into flames.

"We've got you covered Starfox, go!"

"Bill?"

"Hey McCloud, good to see you again, we'll talk later."

Fox turned and hit the turbo boosters, he blazed out of the battle and of the battle and entered Dinosaur Planet's atmosphere, his team was right behind him and had been joined by Bill's squadron. Heat simmered around the fighters and their noses glowed red as the came in steep and fast. Fox looked at his sensor board, it showed a swarm of red and green triangle symbols to represent fighters, and hoards of squares, circles and heat masses to show ground forces. 

"Looks like the party started without us guys, but there's still targets for everyone."

They came in fast and blazed over a serious of fields and forests as the group of fighters entered the battle.

Fox fired a charge shot at one of those strange new fighters, and without waiting to see it hit, came around and fired a burst of laser fire, blowing apart a second fighter. Falco fired a bomb and obliterated a trio of some kind of atmospheric gunship. Laser fire arced from Krystal's fighter and hit one of the starfighters, causing it to spin and collide with another. 

The element of surprise wore off as a squadron of fighters broke off from the main battle and angled right at the Fox and Bill's squadron. Green and red laser bolts flashed between the two groups as they sped right at each other. Then at the last second the two squadrons broke into pairs and scattered in all direction to avoid collision, dispersing into individual, four man dogfights. 

Colonel Bromley dove and avoided a pair of enemy fighters as his squadron and the squad of newcomers broke up and began to duel. Miles took up a position on his wing as they dove into the fray. Bromley launched a pair of scimitar air-to-air missiles at one of the hostile fighters, dove and came up on another's tail blowing him apart before the pilot even realized he had a bogey. The lasers on Mile's Wraith flashed as he shot down another fighter. Then a pair Wraiths near him shattered and a trio of fighters screamed around the explosions. They were different then the other fighters but obviously just as dangerous. Bromley dove as laser fire arced towards him. He took a quick look behind him and saw the trio of new fighters had settled squarely on his and Mile's tail. Bromley dove and weaved, trying to clear his six but the fighters stayed on his tail. A hail of laser bolts flashed by, one narrowly missing his starboard wing. Something caught his eye to his right and he turned just in time to see a laser bolt tear through Mile's port wing, a second hit the engine and a third tore through the part of the hull. 

"I'm hit! Engines have been shot to hell, aaggghhhhh!"

Mile's fighter spun out of control fire and smoke spewing from its aft section and then shattered in a brilliant explosion. For a moment Bromley stared in disbelief, then he felt cold rage build in him. It wasn't enough that he'd had to lose his wife, now he had to lose his childhood friend! 

  
"Hrrrrhhhhh!"

He spun around and flew right at the trio of fighters, his finger holding down the trigger. The fighters scattered as he tore through were they'd just been. He came up behind one the arrowhead shaped fighters. He squeezed the trigger and his plasma cannon hurled a mass of superheated matter at the fighter and his lasers followed it up with a burst of laser fire. The fighter dodged the plasma, but was caught in the barrage of laser fire, one shot tore through one of the dorsal fins and another hit the aft fuselage. The fighter trailed smoke but stayed kept flying and dove hard, then spun into a lateral spiral, trying to shake him.

"I'm hit!" Falco screamed.

Krystal broke off from the dogfight she was in and came around, coming up on the tail of Falco's attacker. She sent laser blasts hurtling at the sleek fighter, but it was no use, the pilot was to good. Suddenly a pair of Cornerian fighters screamed in and began unloading on the fighter. Realizing what they were trying to do Krystal added her own fire to the barrage. The fighter juking  and jinking, dodging most of the incoming fire, but there was too many laser bolts, and the fighter took several hits and began to trail smoke, but suddenly the pilot hit the afterburners and streaked away. Krystal wanted to pursue but another hostile dropped onto her six and she decided to engage this new threat.

Colonel Bromley quickly got control of himself, there was no place for emotion in combat. He turned and looked to make sure none of the fighters were still on his tail. After making sure it was clear he hazarded a quick look at his damage board. His starboard stabalizer had been destroyed and his gee diffuser and engines had taken minor damage, nothing serious but he had no choice but to leave the battle and head back to base for repairs before he overstressed his damaged Wraith and caused some fatal damage. 

Fox looked checked his sensor board. The enemy fighters seemed to retreating, while their ground forces fell back to regroup. 

"Looks like they're retreating Bill, do we have a place to land?"

"Yeah, the Cornerian field base is less than half a kilometer away, we can head there to refuel, rearm, and grab get some rest."

"Right."

The squadron turned and headed west. Fox scanned the series of forests and saw a huge clearing where a group of squat prefabricated buildings stood. The area was a buzz of activity as dropships brought in more troops and prefab buildings. From his vantage point Fox could see groups of workers scurrying about the perimeter, setting up walls using quick-drying cement and stringing in razor wire along the tops of the walls. Others were busy setting up guard towers or pillboxes along the half constructed walls or helping piece together some of the prefab buildings to large for one dropship to carry. He saw Bill's squadron head for an open area of the field where ships of all shapes and sizes stood until a hanger could be built. Fox and his group followed suite. _Sure hope I can snatch a few hours of sleep._ Even while he thought it Fox knew it wasn't likely to happen. 

High Chancellor Grandeur stood on the heavily armored and heavily shielded observation deck of his flagship the "Righteous Fist". He stared out the viewport past the battle at the planet that hung in the void like a small gem. Reports had indicated that the planet had a wealth of natural resources as well as large deposits of many kinds of precious gems, but neither the metal, nor the diamonds, was the most precious resource on that planet. No the most precious resource was something much older and much rarer, something unique. He was a politician to the core and cared little for the militaries opinion of things, nor did he care about the cost of taking that planet. Of course being High Chancellor had its privileges. Because of his position he was the first to know of Intel's findings on the library world of Tobraski in the Dertrillion system. Ancient texts found in the records described a substance of vast power on the moon of Tolow. The moon had been torn apart in a supernova and most of the pieces obliterated. But one piece had been hurled out of the system. The records also contained it's course, and as soon as the system was completely under Brotherhood control he had used his influence to make sure the next fleet was sent along the course the asteroid had taken. It had been a gamble but it had paid off. Here they were in a system rich with resources and theirs for the taking, here was the planet the asteroid had crashed on centuries ago, yes his decision had been correct. He turned away from the viewport and headed for the entrance to the meeting room there was a lot of work to do and this was only the start.


	6. A Red Dawn

Colonel Bromley brought his damage Wraith into the hanger of the Brotherhood field base. His head still reeling from the encounter with the three new fighters and the deaths of several of his wing mates, including Miles. 

"Colonel."

Bromley looked up to see Sydney running towards him, tears in her eyes.

"I heard." She said.

 The two embraced, sharing in their loss. Bromley felt something stir in him; maybe this had some sort of purpose. As Sydney cried against his shoulder he looked at her in a way that he hadn't in a long time, and though it went unspoken from the look in her eyes she felt the same way. 

Fox lay in the bunk inside the small hut-like structure he and Krystal had been given, while Falco had opted to stay in a barracks. It was a small bunk but he and Krystal had managed, this thought brought his gaze to the cerulean furred vixen sleeping beside him, how he loved her. He looked over at the clock 6:30 AM. _Good a time as any to memorize the base layout,_ he thought. Fox was about to climb out of the bunk when a loud siren suddenly started blaring accompanied by a sudden burst of gunfire and explosives. As he flew out of the bunk he heard a strange sounding explosion and the lights dimmed for a second. Krystal rolled out of the bunk and landed on her feet.

"What's going on?"

"The Brotherhood forces must have regrouped, we gotta get to the Arwings!"

Fox said as he zipped up his green coveralls, strapped on his gun belt, and pulled on his gray flak vest. Krystal grabbed her staff and her own gun belt as she ran out the door behind him. A shell exploded nearby sending them both face first to the ground. Fox shook off the moment of disorientation as he yanked out his blaster and clicked the safety off, Krystal followed suite. Together they dashed through the "streets" and the chaos until the reached the landing field. Bill ran toward them from the small air control building.

"It's no use they've dropped and EMP bomb, the aircraft are undamaged but will be unusable for at least two hours!" 

"Shit was anything else disabled?" Fox shouted over the deafening weapons fire.

"No just the aircraft, all the ground vehicles seem to be working just fine."

A voice came over the loudspeaker. 

"All personnel report to the South West perimeter, Brotherhood forces breaking through!"

"Quick follow me!" Bill shouted.

Fox and Krystal followed Bill as he dashed through the streets but where forced to dive behind a pile of supply crates as a burst of blaster fire hit a wall less than two meters from their position. Fox leaned out and fired a burst from his blaster, the energy bolts tearing through the chest of a gray clad enemy soldier. Fox ran and dove behind another group of crates as he slowly worked his way towards the sounds. He noticed Krystal hadn't followed him and turned to see her clambering on to the roof of a small prefab building, then lunge to the roof of a second one. _Smart girl._ Fox thought as he dove behind a stack of quick drying cement bags, that certainly wouldn't be a direction the enemy would be looking. He grabbed an assault rifle from a fallen Cornerian soldier and checked the clip, plenty of ammo left. He turned one last corner and beheld a scene straight from Hell. 

In a large unfinished part of the field base hoards of Cornerian and Brotherhood troops fought, and beyond the unfinished wall he could see an even large battle raging in the nearby fields and forests. He raised his assault rifle and sent a hail of metal bullets flying at half a dozen Brotherhood soldiers. He had the satisfaction of seeing his shots blow one soldiers brains out the back of his head, while a second one got hit in his neck and chest. The other four dove behind assorted building materials and returned fire. Fox ducker back around the corner as bullets and blaster bolts slammed into the wall where his face had been a second ago. A grenade landed next to his boot, and with out thinking he picked it up and threw it back, a moment ladder it went with a loud THUNK. He dove and rolled firing a burst as he went before reaching a crate of construction tools.   
  


"Flank left!" Someone shouted.

Fox peeked around the corner before dashing out and finding a trio of Brotherhood soldiers who had been looking the other way. A burst of gunfire took care of the first two, but the third spun and fired. Fox dove and rolled as the burst of blaster fire tore through where he'd just been. As he came up a booted foot slammed into his stomach, sending him flying against a stack of steel girders. The soldier charged and swung his rifle at him with all his strength. Fox sidestepped and caught the soldier in the stomach with a snap kick then slammed the butt of his gun into adversary's face, snapping his neck. A Cornerian soldier rolled around the corner and clambered behind the girders as a hail of high caliber round tore at the grass and pinged against the other side of the girders. 

"What's going on over there?" Fox shouted as the soldier climbed to his feet.

"The Brotherhood are flooding the perimeter with infantry!" The girders shook as something exploded on the far side.

"And it looks like their tanks are moving in!"

Fox peeked around the corner and sure enough a rugged looking tank was rolling through a gap in the wall, it's machine guns blazing. Suddenly a rocket launcher went off with a loud bang from one of the guard towers and deformed the front half of the tanks. The machine gun on top of the tank's turret turned towards the tower when the soldier fired the launcher's second barrel and blew apart the tanks front end and turret. 

There was a loud rattling sound from somewhere behind him and Fox turned to see a group of Cornerian tanks rolling towards the battle. There was a loud cheer from the Cornerian troops as the tanks opened fire with their machine guns, mowing down groups of Brotherhood soldiers. Fox leaned out from behind cover and began to lay down suppressing fire on a quartet or enemy soldiers. Suddenly there was an a high pitched screaming sound off to his left and Fox looked over just in time to see three Brotherhood gunships coming right at them.

"Get down!" He shouted as he ducked behind the girders again. A hail of high-powered laser blasts cut down Cornerian soldiers and left scorch marks on the ground and the tanks. There was another loud BANG of a rocket launcher going off and the side of one of the gunships shattered as the aircraft screamed out of control and crashed into the forests, splintering trees and bushes before the fuel tank exploded. Fox turned to see Krystal toss aside a spent rocket launcher. She dove behind the girders as enemy fire pummeled their general position.

"Nice shot!" Fox shouted as he picked up a grenade and tossed it back at the Brotherhood soldier who'd thrown it.

The main guns on three of the Cornerian tanks turned and elevated, tracking the two remaining enemy gunships. The tanks shook as their main guns hurled high-speed explosive shells at the pair of gunships. The gunships shattered in crimson fireballs as the tank shells found their marks. Fox risked a quick look around the corner. He caught a glimpse of about twenty Brotherhood soldiers running through gaps in the walls and out into the forests. The fierce battle beyond the wall looked like it was winding down as the Cornerians finally got organized. 

"The Brotherhood is pulling back!" Some shouted.

Fox looked around the large portion of the base perimeter where most of the fighting had taken place. The ground was littered with empty bullet casings, spent clips or power packs and dozens of bodies, Cornerian and Brotherhood alike. The soldier looked over at him.

"Welcome to Dinosaur Planet."


	7. Dark Night

The briefing room was dark and smelled faintly of fresh cleaning solvent, Krystal noted as she sat down in one of the chairs surrounding the holo table at the center of the room. Fox sat down beside her and muttered something about the poor timing of the meeting. Krystal looked at the small clock hanging on the wall; it was 3:00 Am indeed a strange time for a briefing. Cornerian command probably wanted them to leave in just a few hours. General Pepper had wanted someone to head off in the direction of the Brotherhood forces had headed when they pulled back, and attempt to locate and infiltrate the Brotherhood base. Naturally she and Fox had been the first to volunteer. Abruptly the sergeant who had led them here snapped to attention. An officer entered the room, a coyote bearing a Colonel's insignia.

"Greetings, I am Colonel Towns. I have been placed in charge of all covert operations in this system. I understand that you have volunteered for Operation Silent Knife."

"Pardon sir?"

The colonel looked at Fox for a moment and then realized what he meant.

"Oh yes, in other words infiltrating the enemy base."

"Yes we have sir."

"Good, Fox McCloud I presume, and who is this young lady."

"My name is Krystal, of Cerinia."

" I see, well then time is short so let us proceed with the briefing."

The colonel walked over to the holo table and activated, displaying a map of the Cornerian base and the surrounding area.

"As I said time is short so you two will be departing in four hours, it will be just you two since we have no other volunteers. You will be given a pair of jet bikes, as well as some of our latest recon and espionage gear but we'll have to keep it very light if you're going to actually get into the base, so most of your gear will be procured on-site. You will also be given a manual on how to use this gear to memorize on the way, though you may not need it since it's modeled after common field gear and is designed to be able to be used by the common soldier with little difficulty. As for the plan for you two getting in we've provided you with the uniforms and ID's of two fallen Brotherhood soldiers that resemble you, though you will have to dye your fur orange."

He pointed at Krystal then returned his attention to the holo table and a map of a new area appeared.

"Now your target is somewhere in this area. There is a significant distance between our base and theirs, but don't worry you should be able to get to it in less than a day. Once you arrive your primary objective will be to place the electronic bugs we will provide you with into their computer system. Your secondary objective will be to try to find out any information you can about them before returning back here. Any questions?"

"No sir." 

Colonel Towns reached into the small bag he had been carrying and withdrew a small plastic packet and handed it to Krystal.

"This contains everything that you will need for the mission, as well as the field gears manual and the tactical numbers of the two jet bikes you will be taking, good luck."

The Colonel saluted.

"Dismissed!"

Krystal followed Fox out of the room. 

***

Sergeant Bell crawled through the underbrush, his guile suit rustled as its artificial leaves brushed against their living counterparts, his partner close behind. He looked at his chrono, 0315 hours. One minute to go.By now all three teams would be in position as well as all sniper teams and mortar teams to back them up. Twelve seconds. He reached into his pocket and popped a few Pentazemin pills. He raised his sniper rifle and picked a target, an unsuspecting Cornerian soldier sitting in a guard tower eating a ration bar and engaged in an obviously boring conversation with his comrades oblivious to his imminent demise. His chrono emitted a feint beep. Bell pulled the trigger, sending a high caliber armor piercing bullet rocketing toward the soldiers face. His head exploded showering the pair of soldiers sitting near him with blood and gore. Soldiers all over the enemy perimeter fell as snipers opened fire, and the mortar teams launched chaff grenades into the base. Bell dropped the second soldier as the pair flew to their feet, but before he could target the third soldier he dove and crouched out of sight, no doubt shouting to his superiors over his radio. Now as he watched a dozen dark shapes materialized from the forest and sprinted for the wall, ducking into its deep shadow caused by the floodlights. Sergeant Bell zoomed out again and scanned for more targets.

Krystal halted mid sentence as the sound of gunfire erupted somewhere to the south. Fox's eyes met hers.

"Shit." They said in unison.

Krystal dashed for the exit as alarms began to sound and chaos ensued. She yanked out her blaster and clicked the safety off as Fox did the same. She reached the door and slapped the open button. As she charged outside she was almost trampled by a squad of soldiers running in the direction of the gun and blaster fire. 

"Follow them!" Fox shouted 

Krystal sprinted after the group of soldiers when a loud whining sound caused her to look up. A Brotherhood gunship came to a halt in midair and hovered, while twelve soldiers dropped on zip lines. As she dove for cover she noticed two more gunships dropping their own loads of soldiers. She rolled behind a metal barrel as bullets and blaster bolts shot by. She lunged out from behind the barrel and ducked behind a group of overturned crates, the labels said  "Armory Section Three." Krystal opened one of the crates and pulled out a rocket launcher, but as she aimed it at one of the gunships the targeting display burst into static and the word "chaff" appeared on the small display screen. She tossed the useless weapon away in disgust and removed a blaster rifle and power pack. She slammed the pack in and clicked off the safety. She stuck her head out in time to see an enemy soldier drop as the squad of Cornerian soldiers returned. The other commandoes opened fire and three Cornerians fell while the rest dove, rolled, found cover, or returned fire. Krystal lunged out from behind the crate and squeezed the trigger. A flurry of blaster bolts tore through an enemy commando. Suddenly a flurry of high caliber bullets came raining down. As she dove behind the crate again she saw a side mounted machine gun on the gunship mow down a quartet of Cornerian soldiers. The Brotherhood commandos turned and ran as the gunship continued to lay down suppressing fire on the squad of 

Cornerian soldiers. She scanned the area from behind the crates for Fox, but he'd vanished. She ran out from behind the crates and sprinted off in the direction that the soldiers had gone.

***

Fox sprinted dove for cover as a blaster bolt hit a nearby wall. He rounded a corner to face to face with a pair of Brotherhood commandos. As Fox fired a three shots he had the satisfaction of seeing the first commando take a hit to the face while the second got hit in the shoulder of his gun arm. The second commando howled with pain as his own shots went wild. He brought his wounded arm up and fired again. Fox dove and rolled coming up in a crouch. He grabbed the commando's gun arm and wrenched it hard to the left. Fox heard a sickening crunch as something broke in his opponents arm, the soldier screamed and dropped his gun, but suddenly landed a swift knee strike to Fox's stomach. Fox grunted as he sidestepped a serious of furious punches. Ducked an elbow strike and landed a swift left jab to the soldier's stomach, then pistol-whipped him to the face, the commando fell to his knees and collapsed in a heap. Fox leaned against the wall for a second then sprinted back around the corner he'd dove behind during the firefight, looking for Krystal. The gunship was gone and so where the soldiers, but the area was littered with corpses, Cornerian and Brotherhood alike. As Fox looked around one of the dead soldiers comlinks beeped.

"Sergeant, why has your squad not joined lieutenant Heath's squad at the generator complex, sergeant, sergeant?"

"Shit!"

Fox turned and sprinted for all he was worth for the generator complex, there was any number of things that the enemy could do there. He loosed a few shots at a group of Brotherhood commandos as he ran through another firefight but didn't stop to engage. He ran past a muscular Cornerian who'd removed the chain gun from one of the wheeled fast attack vehicles and was using it as a support weapon. Fox skidded to a halt in front of the entrance to the generator bunker. He kicked the door open and ran down the stairs, there was blood and corpses lining the corridor, signs of a recent firefight. As Fox skidded around a corner he almost ran into a quartet of Brotherhood troops. _How the hell did the bastards not see me?_ Fox wondered as he backed around the corner again, but at this point didn't care. He peeked around the corner again, one of the commandos was holding a black box while another was unhooking various wires and hooking them to the box, but all four of the commandos seemed to have their weapons holstered, but they did have odd looking devices in their hands. _Not surprising considering that if they fire their weapons down here they'll destroy this whole bunker._ Fox though as he holstered his blaster and drew his energy sword, he tensed and prepared to activate it. Suddenly a blue shape lunged out of the shadows of another access stairway and swung a gold and blue weapon at one of the commandos. _Krystal!_ As her staff came down in a slash that would of decapitated him, the device in the commando's hand emitted a snap-hiss and a two-pronged energy blade sprung into existence, just in time to intercept the blow. Fox lunged with his own weapon blazing as the other three commandos turned and activated their own energy swords. 

"Fox!" Krystal shouted as Fox ran to her side.

Two commandos walked toward him with their energy swords held up in a high guard, while the other two advanced on Krystal. One of them bellowed a challenge and Krystal raised her weapon, obviously accepting. Time seamed to stop as the two groups charged at each other. Fox brought his sword up at an angle and parried a flurry of slashes from the pair of Brotherhood commandos, he ducked a slash aimed at his head, sidestepped a stab for his stomach, then intercepted a diagonal slash that would've cut in half. This time instead of bringing his sword back up to the ready position the commando pushed with all his strength, sending them into a saber lock. Fox pushed back with all his strength in return… for a moment before sliding his sword along his opponent's blade and pushing it forward instead of against the other sword. The commando screamed as the glowing blade stabbed clear through his stomach. Fox pulled his sword out and lunged around, putting the enemy commando between himself and the commando's comrade. As Fox lunged behind him he swung his energy in a lateral slash to put the soldier out of his misery. The blade slashed clean through his neck and sent the commando's head rolling through the floor. Then the dead commando's comrade was on him, perhaps driven by vengeance he was going completely berserk, slashing left, fight, lateral, horizontal, diagonal, trying to land a dead blow. As Fox's sword clashed with the commando's his opponent swung his blade around at Fox's chest. _Shit._ Fox sidestepped but not fast enough, the energy blades slashed deep into his shoulder, searing flesh and bone. Fox ducked around behind his opponent and lashed out with his muscular tail. The commando took the blow in the stomach and doubled over for a brief moment, and then Fox struck. He lunged and did a 360 in mid air slamming his leg into the soldier's chest and sending him flying back six feet. Fox walked over to his fallen opponent, but the soldier's hand was trying to reach for something, a grenade. _Is he insane?_ Fox thought as he kicked the grenade out of the soldier's hand and slammed the hilt of his sword into his face, knocking him out. Fox looked over to where Krystal was fighting, a commando lay dead on the ground with blood and guts oozing from several slash marks on his chest, while Krystal herself was fighting the second guard. He swung a downward slash and she blocked it on the shaft of her staff, she swung spun her staff around in a lateral arc, but the commando blocked it with his sword before ducking and delivering a hard kick to her stomach. Krystal flew back and hit the wall. But as Fox ran to her aid a trio of small fireballs shot from the tip of her staff and hit the commando at point blank range. He howled in pain as they tore into his chest but didn't stop, searing deep into his chest and burning everything in their path. His eyes rolled back into his head and he fell to his knees, than collapsed in an expanding pool of blood.

"Are you alright?" Fox said as he ran over to her.

"I'm fine." She replied.

"Do you know what they did?'

"Yes, I heard them talking about how this was an EMP bomb. When detonated down here it would fry our whole computer system and communications and cut us off from our orbital forces."

"I see." Fox said as he began to disconnect the wires from the device and removed it. 

"We'd better get this to the Colonel, and see if he still wants us to go out on that mission, Stealthy Sword or whatever it was."

Krystal nodded, but somehow, she knew they would be going out. They were in for a long, bloody stay.


	8. Silent Knife

Fox climbed off the jetbike and pulled the binoculars out of the side compartment. As it turned out Colonel Towns hadn't wanted to cancel the mission, not that he blamed him, by all means it was too important to be cancelled because of a simple sneak attack. Krystal joined him at the edge of the underbrush near the crest of the small hill they were on, below in the small valley was a sprawling Brotherhood base. 

"Well we found it, so much for the easy part." Fox said as he scanned the complex with his binoculars. 

There was a thick concrete wall surrounding the base, topped with razor wire and with guard towers clustered along the perimeter much like its Cornerian counterpart but on a larger scale. Unlike the Cornerian base however this one had wicked looking missile turrets mounted on concrete pedestals behind the walls. Inside the perimeter there were buildings of all shapes and sizes as well as a small communications tower and a large hanger. Fox scanned the skies around the base and found them thick with more of those fighters and gunships he'd seen in battle, as well as scout drones keeping a lookout for enemy forces. But the most interesting part of the base was a somewhat small squat building surrounded with plenty of razor wire, obviously some sort of detention area and maybe worth investigating later. 

"Alright, ready Krystal?" 

The red furred vixen beside him turned to face him. The red dye that he'd helped her hastily apply to her entire body before they left had mostly dried. He smiled at the memory of that particular stimulating experience, a brief moment of pleasure in this war zone. 

"Yeah, it looks like one of the main entrances is pretty close." She replied.

"Ok just remember, your private Christina Anders and I'm private John Stevens."

"Gotch ya."

Together the vulpine pair moved back to their "commandeered Cornerian hardware" and raced to the road leading to the entrance. Fox spun his bike around toward the base and gunned it, Krystal right behind him. As they rounded a corner Fox nearly collided with a lumbering APC headed in the same direction. A hatch popped open on the top and a soldier stuck his head out.

"Watch it you dumbass!" 

Fox did the most soldierly thing he could think of and flicked the guy off. The soldier paused for a second then laughed and ducked back inside.

"Well that went well." Krystal said as she pulled beside Fox as they slowed down to match speeds with the APC.

Fox didn't dare say anything like it this close to the enemy but this was an incredible stroke of luck, they would appear less suspicious if they reached the base with other stragglers from the attack force last night. He leaned back slightly and enjoyed the tickling feeling of the wind ruffling his short face fur.

**** 

General Osborn was not a happy man and he didn't really care if the military aid in the room knew it. The chameleon general's skin had taken on a red tinge as he read the report again. The casualty reports were high as was to be expected of a high-risk operation gone sour, but that wasn't what bothered him, it wasn't even the fact that the Grand Chancellor would have his head on a platter if he knew. Seventeen of those casualties had been inflicted to some of his best commandos by two individuals, that was unacceptable! He flipped the page, they were vulpine, one male one female, the male was a typical red fox while the female was of an unknown subspecies. Reports from survivor's stated that both used typical ballistic or energy based weapons and didn't appear to wear any special armor or combat suits. The male also wielded an advanced type of energy sword, while the female used a staff weapon. He flipped to the page that showed detailed photos of both of them and their weapons. His breath left his throat. The male appeared to be slightly more powerfully built than the average red fox, not much but just enough so that it was vaguely noticeable. The same with the female, and while she did not appear to have as much physical strength as the male her muscle mass was definitely more than a typical vixen in proportion to her body mass. But it was not any of these details that had gotten his attention, not even the females perfect body and impressive figure. It was that looking at a picture of her she looked almost exactly like someone else he knew, true there were some differences but that was to be expected, he would have to report this immediately. Osborn set the report aside and picked up another set of documents, these ones describing the status of the entire ground operation on the planet. The local resistance had been crushed within an eighty-nine percent guarantee. The construction of several more bases were underway, as well as prison camps, and recon teams had already found the "sites of scientific significance." Osborn snorted; the scientists were placing an awful lot of emphasis on building a base over one of these sites, definitely a lot going on behind the scenes on that one. Also it appeared that the hostile military force that had landed on the planet was becoming quite a nuisance and would need to be dealt with sometime soon. The general sighed and picked up the cup of coffee sitting at the corner of his desk. He poured down the cups contents before hauling himself to his feet, no matter what he did the Grand Chancellor wasn't going to like this, but that was okay, Osborn didn't like him either.

Hydraulics whirred as the heavy metal gate slid into the ground and one of the soldiers in a guard tower waved them forward. Fox edged his jetbike forward as the APC rumbled through the gate. The group followed a pair of soldiers past all manner of buildings, hoards of troops and personnel walking through the streets, and past all manner of parked vehicles to a medium sized building situated next to a row of barracks building. The large door rolled up and the group moved inside while the door rolled shut behind them. The lights in the warehouse came on as a squad of tired and dirty soldiers filed out of the APC. A door at the end of the large room opened and a squad of soldiers trained weapons on them while an officer entered. The troops lined up and stood at attention, Fox and Krystal followed suit as the officer walked down the row.

"Present your dog tags!" 

The soldiers pulled out their dog tags containing their names, ranks, unit numbers, and service numbers. The officer examined each, paused for a moment in front of Krystal and continued on. 

  
"Welcome back ladies, you're very late. You know the drill; you have thirty minutes to get yourselves squared away before reporting to your squad's assigned debriefing room. Get your sorry asses moving, double time!"

The group of soldiers scattered as the troops jogged toward a smaller door. Fox and Krystal followed the group of soldiers out the back door as a group of engineers entered to check the vehicles for bugs and to examine the two Cornerian jetbikes. As they stepped back into the sunlight the group of soldiers broke up, heading to their assigned barracks. The vulpine pair walked down the row of barracks buildings until they came to one that's number matched the squad number they'd had to memorize on the way here. Fox entered first with Krystal behind him, fortunately the hallway was empty at the moment, even better the special forces barracks had small but private two person quarters rather than simple rows of bunks, which would come in handy when it came time to start moving about and start gathering data. As they entered the room that bore their names Fox walked over to the bed that bore his fake name and wedged the small packet of espionage equipment up among the support beams that held the bunk up while Krystal pawed through the duffel bag of the bunks previous owner, but obviously didn't find anything useful. Fox removed a small device from the espionage packet and moved it around the room, sweeping for bugs, he didn't find any. 

"Well we should be able to talk freely in here if we sweep it daily and talk in whispers." 

Krystal thought it over. Aside from the carefully chosen equipment they'd had on them when they arrived the only other resources they had at their disposal were anything useful in the duffel bags of the room's former occupants or whatever else they could find. She produced the "field wrench" from here pocket, it was slender and had some strangely shaped edges but on closer inspection those edges were to sharp to be the ends of a wrench, her staff incognito. Fox also had an oddly shaped "field wrench", the disguised hilt of his energy sword with the wrench like ends designed to be quickly detached if need be. These and the standard issue Brotherhood weapons they'd been given were their only weapons. She wasn't sure where the armory was, but if they got into a situation where they needed that much firepower than their mission would already be over.

Krystal picked up the datapad lying on the table and brought up a map of most of the base. She memorized part of it, than slid the datapad into one of her uniforms pockets. She sat down in the chair and leaned back against the wall. Well they'd gotten this far, now for the hard part.


	9. Knowing One's Enemy

Krystal stepped through the door into their quarters after returning from her extensive debriefing to find Fox already typing away on the computer in the corner. 

"How'd you get back here so fast?" She said.

"Your debriefing ran a good hour longer than mine Krys."

The vixen checked her chrono to discover that he was right.

"Wow. So what have you found out?"

"Well it took me most of this time to crack their security software, but I've been able to find a lot stuff about troop movements, rosters, officers, and the like. It looks like they're definitely from another star system, but it gets better, the Brotherhood that's what they call themselves, is divided into three major sections, the military, the scientists, and the politicians. Rigid, almost caste-like barriers exist between these three groups and they appear to be in constant distrust of each other. The Brotherhood controls three other star systems called the K'wailan system, the Tersitrion system, and the Dertrillion system. The exception to the caste rule is their leader; High Chancellor Grandeur. He's mostly politician but has a small military and scientific background." The red furred vulpine replied.

"Have you been able to find anything on what they want from us?" Krystal asked.

"Not much, just that Dinosaur Planet has some sort of significance to them. Anything else will be better encrypted and I don't have the hacking skills to get to them without alerting the enemy to our presence." Fox replied.

Fox shut off the computer and popped the outer casing open; he stuck one of the electronic bugs inside and connected the wires to it. The squad of Cornerian electronic specialists back at the base would be able to use the bug to hack into the Brotherhood's files. Their mission was complete, now all they had to do was stay a little while as not to look suspicious, then get out of here.

High Chancellor Grandeur looked up from the serious of papers on his desk.

"Are you telling me General that even though we have far superior numbers we have been unable to crush these insurgents who continue to harass us?" He said icily. 

The general's skin began to shift its color, turning a feint red.

"No sir, I'm saying that they have proven formidable and all of our attempts to dislodge them have failed."

Grandeur stood up.

"THEN I SUGGEST YOU USE GREATER NUMBERS!" He bellowed.

"Drown them in blood, use as many troops as you need to and do whatever necessary to drive them away."

"But sir, why simply hurl troops at them and spend their lives like so many insects." 

"Why, I'll tell you why because your idiotic schemes haven't produced results so we must restore our tarnished image of invincibility. We must make our next attack one that they will remember, so that the next time our forces are on the horizon they will fear another attack like it. Will you do this or do I detect a flaw in your faith."

"No… sir."

"Good, than get the hell out of my office and make things happen, the attack must come in three days from now at the latest."

General Osborn hurried out of Grandeur's office seething with rage. Grandeur smiled and allowed himself to lean back a little in his chair. That had gone well. Soon these filthy insurgents who dare defy him would be thrown off this planet and then his scientists would be free to do their work in peace. It sent a shiver of anticipation down his spine as he fantasized for a moment what they could create with the precious substance buried deep within the planet. Perhaps it could accomplish his ultimate goal, wiping out this pathetic system, a final settling of the scores for past wrongs. Grandeur lifted a glass of liquor to his mouth; truly these would be glorious times.

****

Fox awoke in pools of his own sweat. He looked at the bedside chrono, it was 2.15 AM. In the dream he had just had. He'd seen a vast field of charred corpses, among them Bill's and Falco's. Something had told him to walk into the field of horrors, but he had barely taken a step into field when a weak hand grabbed his boot. He had looked down to find a Cornerian marine with a large bloody mass where his chest should've been. He had knelt and gently propped the marines head up.

"What happened here?"

The soldier tried to speak, his voice no more than a feint, hoarse whisper.

"They…urrghh… came in thousands… aghh… we weren't prepared and we… never had a chance."

The soldier coughed more blood and all life faded from his eyes. Fox gently eased his head down and looked around, he recognized this place, the Cornerian field base on Dinosaur Planet. He caught a feint glimpse of movement and looked just in time to see a feint slightly shimmering vulpine outline vanish into the air. He had barely caught a glimpse of it but it had looked so familiar, someone from his past? A thunderous laughter sounded in Fox's ears as a black mist swirled in the distance, not quite taking shape but forming a feint outline, behind this figure a dozen horribly deformed figures materialized out of the jungle, Cornerian soldiers, Brotherhood soldiers, and a pair of sharpclaw all resembling what they might have looked like if you killed one, buried him, and dug him up two weeks later.  

"What's wrong Fox?"

Fox climbed out of his bunk and started to get dressed.

"We've got to get back to the Cornerian base."

Krystal climbed out of her bunk, how lovely she looked in her panties and bra as always. 

"What's going on, what's wrong?"

"Everyone there is in danger, I had a dream were I saw them all dead, and it just felt so real I have to trust it."

"I understand."

"Can you check when the next reconnaissance team is scheduled to leave?"

Krystal sat down in the chair and hurriedly typed a command on the computer.

"The next team will leave in less than thirty minutes. Two soldiers will report to vehicle garage one seven to take a pair of LAV light vehicles."

"Good, if this is all true the Cornerian hackers might not have gotten all this information yet. I'll take the data module and hide it in one of the LAV's where its mission log recording module would normally be."

"Right, I'll see if I can get a tight beam transmission to the base ahead of time to give them more time to prepare."

"Good luck Krys."

  
"Thanks, you too."


	10. Chaos Reigns

Fox dashed from one shadow to another. Even with the fake identity Towns had given him he had to be careful. He didn't have authorization to be in this area at this time and if he got caught he would be in a shit load of trouble. He'd reached garage one-seven without incident, but that didn't necessarily mean anything. He took a few moments to pick the lock before entering the garage and locking it behind him. He crept over to one of the LAV's and removed the panel on the vehicle's body. Inside there were wires everywhere with the data module resting in a small black box. Fox removed the first data module and set it on the vehicles hood, then slipped the data module containing the stolen Brotherhood data into the slot. He was about to close the panel again when the lock on the door clicked.

"Oh shit."

Fox grabbed the data module off the hood and looked around quickly for a place to hide. He would never be able to reach the piles of crates and maintenance equipment in time and the LAV sat too low to the ground to crawl under. In desperation he jumped up on top of the vehicle and leapt with all his strength.

A lone guard walked in carrying an assault rifle. Fox hung suspended between two girders hidden in the shadows of the garages rafters in a classic split jump, still if the guard took more than a cursory glance at the ceiling he'd be in a lot of trouble. The guard walked across the garage casually looking around and was about to head to the door again when he noticed the open panel on the LAV. He tensed and looked around; Fox cursed himself for not shutting it. The guard removed a comlink from his pocket; Fox only had one option now. He dropped out of his split jump and slowly lowered himself down with his arms, hitting the floor silently. The guard was raising his comlink to his face and was about to click the talk button, when Fox sank his teeth into his throat and bit down hard. Even if the guard hadn't suddenly become paralyzed from the neck down he wouldn't have had a chance. The guard tried to scream but his throat was pinched shut and the only sound that came from his mouth was a feint gurgle, he tried to breath but he couldn't feel his chest, and in moments his vision faded and blackness took him. Fox stood up and wiped the blood from his face before shutting the panel on the LAV's hood. He removed the comlink from the guards limp hand and pushed a few buttons, if security command tried to raise the guard it would sound like he was simply having comlink trouble. Fox slipped the comlink back into the guards pocket then dragged him over to the maintenance equipment, making sure not to get any blood on the ground, and hid him in an empty storage locker. He walked over to the darkest part of the room and hid among a pile of storage crates to wait for Krystal.

Krystal entered the dimly lit main room of the base's secondary communication center. With most of the comm. traffic being handled by the main communication center or the command center things were always quiet at this center, a perfect place to send a covert transmission, another plus is was only two hundred meters away from garage one-seven. The center's only technician looked up as she entered and for a brief moment his jaw nearly dropped.

"Hello, what's a cute guy like you doing working the night shift?" Krystal said as she sat down next to the technician and, just for a little added effect moved even closer to him.

He had that love struck look in his eyes and Krystal could see a slight bulge in his pants, just below the waistline. She smiled just a little more, hook, line, and sinker.

The technician looked around, if he got caught he would get seventy percent pay decrease but fuck it, here was a very hot chick that unlike any of the other girls he'd met looked like she had the hots for him. He through his arms around her and began to lick her neck. He was about to reach down and run his hand over her large breasts when her knee suddenly slammed into his groin. Krystal jumped back as the technicians released his embrace on her and delivered a kick to his sternum. He staggered out of his chair and began to stumble to his feet when her elbow suddenly locked around his neck and the cold metal of a gun barrel pressed against the side of his head, the last thing he saw was her raise the pistol above his head and bring it down hard.

Krystal stepped over the unconscious body and sat down in the technician's chair. She messed with some of the settings before switching to the Cornerian Intelligence frequency.

"Attention, attention, this is Krystal McCloud to Cornerian Intelligence, authorization Silent Knife, a large attack is imminent, Brotherhood comm. activity near your base is increasing and I'm tracking enough comm. traffic one of the routes to your base to suggest that at least several thousand soldiers are en route, over."

She had to hurry, while nobody knew what she said they would know that a transmission was just sent. It would take them at least ten three minutes to make sure no messages had been sent to this comm. center to tell her to transmit anything and another five minutes to get someone over here to check it out. By then she and Fox would be out of here… if they hurried. She sprinted out of the comm. center and fighting the urge just to sprint to the garage, stealthily jogged through the shadows the door was already unlocked and she hurried in. Fox was dragging a pair of unconscious soldier behind a pile of crates, the real pilots for the recon mission.

"How much time do we have?"

"By now I'd say about six and a half minutes." She replied.

"We'd better hurry."

Krystal climbed into her LAV and started the engine, while Fox ran over to the wall and hit a button. As he jogged back to his LAV and climbed in the large door on the south wall of the garage slowly heaved open. The two vulpines stepped on the gas and maneuvered out onto the road and headed for the main gate.

Sergeant Cambridge surveyed the long column of troops from his perch on a tanks turret. As far as the eye could see there were countless tanks, APC's, light vehicles, artillery, and thousands of troops, some on foot some riding on or in the vehicle, all arrayed in squads, platoons, or battalions, ready for war. Trees toppled beneath the mighty tanks, underbrush was crushed by APC's and trampled by infantry, the path behind them was a mess of crushed trees and undergrowth covered with the tracks from wheels and treads alike, and countless boot prints in the mud. Just as this forest was being forced into submission and left in ruins so would the base full of enemies who dared defy the Brotherhood. It was early evening but already dark and getting darker. The sky was full of clouds and had that feeling of imminent thunderstorm. This would be a glorious battle.

Fox gunned his engine after passing through the two security gates, leaving the Brotherhood base far behind him. Krystal's LAV raced alongside his as they sped down the Brotherhood road as if they had the very hounds of hell behind them. Krystal turned off onto a side road that soon devolved into a mere trail, and Fox struggled not to lose sight of her. Underbrush and low hanging branches snapped and shattered as they hit the vehicles canopy as the trail got even thinner. Then the two vehicles suddenly burst through the forests and into a large meadow, taking this opportunity to crack their throttles wide open. The view outside the canopy was nothing but a green blur as the speedometer reached its peek. Krystal ramped off the hill at the end of the meadow and flew clear over a river before crashing down in another meadow, and Fox gunned it to do the same. He hazarded a quick look at the darkening sky. It was a solid sheet of dark gray clouds as far as the eye could see, blacking out the sunset and casting their mighty shadow over the entire area. As Fox flew through a third meadow raindrops began to hit the canopy, a quick look around him confirmed that it had begun to rain lightly. As he approached the edge of the forests again he returned his full attention to driving. At this speed it would take them less then an hour to reach the Cornerian base, but even at this speed, he doubted they would beat the Brotherhood army to the base. He coaxed a little more speed form his LAV while outside it began to rain harder.


	11. Havoc!

General Pepper walked along the south perimeter of the Cornerian field base, where hoards of Cornerian marines were gathering. The evacuations were underway and right now all non-combat personnel were helping load all the important equipment they could into waiting transports, while others piled into dropships for evac. He returned his attention to the perimeter. A steel walkway had been hastily bolted onto part of the wall to allow more troops to fire at incoming hostiles. The walkways and guard towers were crammed with soldiers, some manning heavy tripod guns or wielding everything from assault rifles to rocket launchers. Still, five hundred against several thousand was not good odds and many of the marines clustered at the wall would die here, today, but of their own free will to allow others to escape. The sky was black now, and Pepper could see lightning flashing in the distance, soon the storm would be here too.

"There they are!"

General Pepper climbed onto one of the walkways and raised his binoculars, the marine was right. A sea of lights and dark shapes were coming up over the top of the hill, all around him weapons cocked and safeties clicked off. General Pepper climbed down from the walkway and headed away from the perimeter to let the soldiers do their work.

The army reached the top of the hill and came to a stop. Thousands of troops and vehicles spread out across the crest of the hill until they filled the tops of all the hills on this side of the valley. A roar went up as thousands of voices were raised, bellowing challenges. Neither the Brotherhood nor the Cornerians fired, but sat staring across the wide-open hillside at each other. As if whatever God governed the universe had taken pity on all the soldiers about to die thunder clashed and the dark sheet of clouds began to pour rain. The ground shook as the soldiers began to stomp in unison, faster and faster. The bellowing increased, and a Brotherhood officer climbed on top of a rock, energy sword blazing in his hand. He raised his sword high above his head and it was as if his voice boomed louder than all the others. He slashed his sword forward and bellowed a booming battle cry.

"Haaavoooc!!!"

The bellowing increased to a deafening roar as thousands of soldiers and vehicles thundered down the hill in a great tidal wave of bodies and steel. Thousands of weapons suddenly opened fire in a symphony of death and destruction.

Brotherhood soldiers fell by the dozen as the Cornerians pummeled them with weapons fire, killing countless soldiers as they ran through the vast open area between the base and the hilltop. But the Cornerians were not spared from the carnage, marines dropped like rain as walls of bullets, blaster bolts, and tank shells pounded them like so many raindrops. A marine bellowed a battle cry as he held down the trigger of his tripod gun, spraying a squad of Brotherhood troops with a flurry of high caliber bullets, before a rocket hit his guard tower and tore him into a thousand pieces. A pair of marines mowed down a two Brotherhood flag bearers before being torn apart by a hail of blaster fire. As the Brotherhood forces reached the bottom of the hill a deafening cheer went up from the Cornerian marines as the main wave of transports roared off the landing field and tore a path through the gloom and rain. A hail of artillery shells came raining down on the base from the top of the hill, shattering buildings, ripping apart soldiers, and crushing tanks. The walkways became slick with blood as marine after marine was shot down, massive cracks formed in parts of the south wall as it was pummeled with tank shells. The Brotherhood soldiers charged across the open field that ran from the base of the hill to the walls of the Cornerian base through a sea of mutilated corpses as the rain came pouring down. They were cut down in droves, the once green grass running red with their blood, but for every soldier that was killed, seven would take his place. A row of soldiers carrying heavy metal riot shields marched side by side in a long row, forming a phalanx, a platoon of machine gunners crouching behind them. Bullets bounced off the thick metal shields and blaster bolts thudded harmlessly against them, while the machine gunners crouching behind the phalanx returned fire. A flurry of high-powered blaster bolts from tripod caused the shield bearers to stagger against the force of the blows, while their shields began to glow a fiery red. A second storm of high-powered shot punched through many weakening shields, tearing through the soldiers carrying them and showering the machine gunners with blood and guts. Many shield bearers went down, and many more were torn apart by rockets and grenades but the phalanx did not stop. At that point a hail of tank shells blew apart parts of the south wall, spraying the marines inside with deadly concrete shards. The Brotherhood troops continued to fall, some within meters of the gaps in the wall, but the Cornerian defender's numbers were falling faster then the Brotherhoods. The phalanx reached the gap and marched through, shields parting just enough to admit the muzzles of a dozen assault weapons. A hail of rockets slammed into the phalanx, shattering shields and tearing apart soldiers, wiping out the phalanx… but it was too late. Brotherhood soldiers swarmed the gaps in the wall, charging over countless fallen comrades, while more charged through the blood stained field ignoring the mangled corpses, guts, and internal organs that littered the ground. Cornerian and Brotherhood soldiers flooded into the breach, firing in each other's faces and beating each other with their metal weapons, fighting harder than many of them had ever fought in their lives.

"Fall back, fall back!"

The blood drenched major who shouted the command was torn apart by a burst of bullets as he turned to run.

Sergeant Andrew Stevenson ran through the blood drenched chaos firing as he went tearing apart a pair of Brotherhood soldiers, and beating soldiers with his metal assault rifle. Marines sprinted past him, falling back farther into the base. He turned and ran, leaping over a mass of corpses and almost slipping on the blood stained concrete. A marine near him was torn in half by a flying slab of concrete as a building near them was hit by a tank shell. As he dove behind a pile of sand bags that had been set up ahead of time as a fallback point another cheer went up as a swarm of transports and dropships took off, clawing desperately for altitude, but several were not so lucky. A flurry of rockets and tank shells screamed after them and several were hit, blowing apart and spewing their hapless passengers, some still alive into the sky. An unearthly screaming came from the east and Stevenson turned to see a squadron of atmospheric fighters making a making a strafing run. Marines were hit by laser blasts and evaporated, rockets tore apart buildings and vehicles. Stevenson raised his rifle and emptied his clip on one of them, futilely. They disappeared into the gloom, but the unearthly screaming returned, they were coming back. They screamed in low, mowing down marines and laying waste to buildings, some getting hit by rockets but many undamaged. This time however they did not return. Waves of Brotherhood soldiers charged through the carnage, relentlessly pursuing the marines, gunning down stragglers or helpless wounded. Stevenson ran to a tripod gun, its dead gunner spewing his guts onto the ground from a dozen bullet holes. He pulled the charging lever and with a battle cry turned it on the Brotherhood pursuers, tearing many hapless soldiers to pieces with a hail of blaster bolts thicker than his fists. Bullets and blaster bolts tore through a group of marines standing next to him, one of them got up a wolf lieutenant with a submachine gun in each hand and spewing blood from half a dozen bullet holes in his torso.

"Go dammit, get your ass out of here, don't wait for me!"

Stevenson didn't bother to protest, he turned and ran as the submachine guns roared behind him constantly for several seconds, than fell silent. He ran past an overturned light combat vehicle and almost tripped over the vehicle's gunner, who from the looks of him had been thrown clear but had broken his legs when he hit the ground. From the blood seeping out from under the vehicle the driver and passenger had not been so lucky. He was about to bend over and throw him over his shoulders when the marine looked him in the eyes.

"Leave me."

Stevenson unbuckled his grenade belt and pressed it into the marine's blood soaked hands before running on. He was almost to the airfield now… if anyone had come back for them. A loud rumbling caught his attention and he dove face first onto the blood soaked concrete before looking up, expecting another attack from above. But rather than Brotherhood fighters it was a Cornerian dropship with its doors open and zip lines hanging down. Stevenson ran towards it, several marines were already climbing up the zip lines. It began to move again just before he reached it and he lunged for a zip line, grabbing a hold of it as the dropship blazed up into the sky. He fastened the zip line to the metal ring on his belt and began to pull himself up as it flew higher. Thankfully they began to reel in the zip lines and he was hauled into the troop bay, but as he turned to look past the closing doors he beheld a sight that would be forever burned into his memory. The sloping hills, the fields outside the base, and the streets of the base itself were red with the blood of well over a thousand soldiers, and were littered with corpses, Brotherhood and Cornerian alike, laying on top of each other, their blood mixing into one massive crimson pool. He couldn't remove his gaze from the sight until the doors closed. In all his years of fighting he had never seen anything on that great a scale, and the words he'd heard a thousand times echoed in his head; war is hell.

Fox and Krystal shot past hoards of Brotherhood soldiers as they flew over the crest of the hill oblivious to Stevenson's hardships. They raced down the hillside, while Brotherhood soldiers jumped out of the way, thinking they were more of their comrades. They blazed through a hole in the wall and through the streets before screeching to a halt. Fox pulled the small lever next to the control panel and the canopy popped open. As he jumped out of the cramped cockpit the smell of death assaulted his sensitive vulpine nose, but that was nothing compared to what he saw. Everywhere he looked hoards of corpses lay in widening pools of their own blood.

"Come on, we have to hurry!" He shouted to Krystal.

Pausing just long enough to grab the data module from Fox's LAV the pair ran through the carnage toward the airfield in time to see the last few dropships roar off into the sky. Krystal sprinted after Fox, the pouring rain washing away the dye in her fur and exposing the cerulean fur underneath. As they reached the edge of the airfield where a hoard of Brotherhood troops were engaging a platoon of bloody and wounded Cornerian marines, one of the Brotherhood soldiers spotted them and gave a surprised look as he saw the blue furred vixen. He pulled something out of his pocket, looked at it, looked at her, and tossed it aside.

"Uhhh Fox."

It was too late the soldier shouted.

"It's them, don't let them get away!"

Thirty soldiers turned away from the firefight and charged after them with weapons blazing. In an instant Fox had his energy sword in his hand and the blade disintegrated the fake wrench end as it sprung into existence. Krystal whipped out her staff and it tore off the false tool ends as it telescoped outward and locked into the combat position. Fox sprung in front of her, his sword blazing in fiery arcs as it disintegrated bullets and sent blaster bolts ricocheting off into the sky or into walls. Krystal brought her staff up and fired a flurry of fist-sized fireballs, mowing down a pair of the soldiers. The soldiers stopped firing as a dozen Brotherhood soldiers dropped from a building beside them, brandishing metal swords and bayonets. She whipped her staff up and using it like a spear stabbed through the nearest soldier's chest, then spun it up and whipped it a figure eight, slicing apart the next soldier. She ducked a slash from a bayonet and raised her staff above her head, the Brotherhood soldier raised his rifle to block the slash but her staff cut through his weapon and slashed his face into, she hazarded a quick look in Fox's direction. His blade was a blur as he cut through weapons and their wielders in half, he became a whirlwind of death as he slashed apart any soldiers foolish enough to get within his reach, a number of soldiers already laying in pieces at his feet. Krystal returned her attention to the battle and she slammed her staff's shaft into a soldier's face, then whipped it around and cut his torso open, spilling his guts onto the blood drenched ground. A few moments later they were the only fighters still standing. Krystal brought her staff up and sprayed a smoke screen of icy mist as more soldiers poured into the street after them firing blindly into the mist. Together she and Fox turned and ran onto the airfield, past rows of wrecked fighters.

"There!"

She shouted as she caught site of their Arwings sitting side by side in a corner. Thankfully Falco's and Bill's fighters were gone. She retrieved a small device from her pocket and pressed a button, Fox did the same. The canopies on their Arwings opened and she hopped into the cockpit. Fox leapt into his own ship as she engaged the engines and retracted the landing gear; a moment later she blasted off the airfield with Fox's Arwing right alongside her. Together they blazed through the rainy sky and broke through the clouds into a sunny sky that belied the carnage below the clouds. As they left the atmosphere she realized how lucky they were to have survived this day and live to fight another, while many had not.


	12. Fire in Space

            Captain Whitcomb stood on the bridge, trying to concentrate despite the alarms and flashing lights all around him. A technician turned from his console to face him.

"Sir, most of the second wave of dropships is onboard and the last few that went back for the marines are inbound."

"Good, helmsman prepare to get us out of here, navigator have a course plotted and ready when we clear the planet's gravity well."

The ship shook as it was hit by another salvo of laser blasts more than a meter thick, and although it hadn't seemed possible, even more warning sirens and flashing lots started up.

            Outside the viewport Whitcomb saw a storm of laser blasts tear through the battle cruiser Defiance. Huge chunks of tristed, melted metal were torn from the ships hull as it began to spew wreckage of every kind into the space around it, like a warrior lying in a pool of his own blood. With a final explosion the running lights on the ship's starboard side flickered and went out, the glow from its engine exhaust ports died, and the ship began to spin like a stray asteroid. Something else suddenly caught Whitcombs attention, a Brotherhood frigate came plowing through the floating debris, maneuvering to avoid the ravaged hull of the Defiance and came at them at flank speed with its heavy guns already turning to come to bear on the Defender, seemingly pointed directly at him.

"Damn it isn't fighting another battle cruiser enough, now we have to fight a frigate and an enemy battle cruiser." He thought out loud.

Whitcomb smiled as an idea came to him.

"Helmsman set to course two-nine-five and get me flank speed."

"Yes sir, be advised we will be headed right for that Brotherhood frigate."

"That's the idea lieutenant."

            The ship rumbled and shook as it accelerated, picking up as it went. The Brotherhood frigate grew larger and larger in the viewport as they sped towards it, but showed no signs of moving.

"Ten seconds to impact sir, nine, eight, seven."

"Sound collision alarms lieutenant."

"Yes sir."

A deafening alarm klaxon began to sound throughout the ship.

"Six, five, four, three."

            The captain of the Brotherhood frigate finally lost his nerve and the ship suddenly went hard to port, trying desperately to get out of the way. The frigate swung off to port with speed the Defender couldn't match, but that was all part of the plan.

"Brace for impact!"

            A deafening screeching came from somewhere on the starboard side and the entire ship shook as the two warships graced just barely graced each other. Energy arced around the two ships as their shields were torn away by the impact.

"Fire all starboard and aft weapons."

A flurry of crimson energy blasts arced from the Defender and stabbed into the frigate, boiling away hull plating and tearing apart the ships bowels. The frigate went into an uncontrolled spin as the Defender blazed past it. Captain Whitcomb let out the breath he'd realized he'd been holding and looked at the countdown timer that displayed the estimated to clear the planet's gravity well, four minutes.

The sky was replaced by the blackness of space as Krystal blazed out of Dinosaur Planet's atmosphere and into space, where a fierce battle was taking place as the outnumbered Cornerians tried to retreat. Fox's Arwing roared by hers and into the battle, dodging a large chunk of wreckage. Krystal activated a turbo boost and followed him. Hoards of fighters screamed by as they shot through the battle pausing occasionally to pick of a Brotherhood fighter or two. Krystal dove hard to the left as a Cornerian carrier was torn apart by a massive explosion, and flew under the remains of a Brotherhood light cruiser. As she came out from behind the wreck she could see the Cornerian fleet up ahead, the only problem was that a Brotherhood destroyer was between them and it.

"Krystal break left and hit the brakes!"

Without thinking she dodged to the and a burst of laser fire tore through the empty space where she'd just been, as she hit the breaks a Wraith screamed by and was blown apart by a laser blast from Fox's Arwing.

"Thanks Fox."

Before Fox could reply a storm of laser blasts began to arc by as the gunners on the destroyer spotted them and opened fire. Sweat began to run down her brow as she entered the storm of laser blasts and began dodging and juking, trying to make herself a difficult target. The storm of death intensified as the pair of fighters got closer and closer to the destroyer's gray hull.

"Krystal slave your targeting computer to mine and get ready to fire all your bombs on my mark, ready, three, two, one, now!"

Eight novastar bombs shot out of their launchers and lanced toward the destroyer.

"Pull up, pull up!"

            Krystal jammed the stick back as her Arwing blazed over the Brotherhood ship missing the hull by mere meters. There was a massive explosion behind her as the bombs hit. The first six bombs hit the destroyer's shields creating a small opening for just a brief instant, the last two bombs shot through the hole in the shields and slammed into the hull, tearing apart three gun turrets and causing an explosive decompression on that deck as they breached the hull. The engine glow from the back of Fox's Arwing flared, signaling a turbo boost, Krystal cracked the throttles wide open and left the destroyer behind.

            Warships were torn apart by massive explosions, swarms of fighters engaged in their deadly dance while flying storms of laser fire from the capital ships, through the chaos blazed six dropships. Sweat trickled down Caitlin Monroe's forehead and she raised a hand to her face and wiped it away, wishing she was in the cockpit of her Broadsword fighter instead of this sluggish flying monstrosity. She rolled the dropship to the left to avoid a spinning, burning Wraith and tried to urge or more speed from the dropship as she streaked past a burning Cornerian frigate.

"Heads up Wraiths at three o'clock."

            Katt glanced to the left and caught a glimpse of three Wraiths screaming in on an attack run.

"Break formation!"

            The dropships scattered as the Wraiths attacked, desperately trying to outrun the smaller, faster fighters. The trio of Wraiths settled in behind one of the dropships and opened fire, sending ruby laser blasts tearing through space after the hapless dropship. They screamed past the ship as it was torn apart by an explosion and settled onto the next dropship's six blowing it apart just as fast. She cursed as the three fighters came in on her tail like predator's falling upon a sluggish herbivore. She dove and juked as laser blasts arced by and winced as one of them tore a tail fin off. Suddenly one of the Wraiths exploded. The second was torn apart by a flurry of laser blasts and the third was hit by a homing shot as it dove and streaked away. Katt looked in the direction the fire came from and saw three Cornerian Broadsword fighters scream by. She tossed a salute to the anonymous fighter pilots and then dove hard to avoid flying debris as a Cornerian light cruiser was torn apart by heavy laser fire. As she flew around the explosion she spotted the battlecruiser Defender maneuvering at flanks speed for the edge of the system and pummeling any Wraiths that got too close with its numerous weapon emplacements. She pushed a little more speed from the dropship and entered the sphere of protection provided by the Defender's covering fire. The other three dropships entered the safety of the battle cruiser's starboard hanger. Katt brought her dropship through the hanger's wide entrance as the massive doors began to close. She began the landing cycle and as the dropship settled to the metal hanger floor, Katt collapsed back in her chair and closed her eyes for a second before pushing the button to open the troops doors and heading aft to the troop compartment as the marines piled out hoping she would never again have to fly one of these oversized bullet magnets again.

            Fox and Krystal were the last ships to enter the Defender's port side hanger. As their Arwings touched down the massive hanger doors closed and sealed. Fox jumped down from his Arwing's cockpit and felt the entire ship begin to vibrate, a hyperspace jump. He wiped the sweat from his face and walked over to where Krystal's Arwing had landed. A jump alarm sounded, announcing that the ship was jumping to hyperspace, leaving the battle behind but with every intention of finishing it another day.


	13. The Evolution of Evil

            Colonel Bromley stood on the hilltop overlooking the field where the battle had taken place last night. The corpses littering the ground were so numerous that in many places the ground was hidden by bodies or dried blood with the occasional smoking ruins of a tank lying among the carnage, the former Cornerian field base had by no means been spared from the carnage. Living soldiers littered the field as well, recovering weapons or performing the particularly unpleasant task of moving the corpses. The wounded soldiers that were too badly wounded to be moved were laying on stretchers in a part of the field that had already been cleared of bodies where groups of medics tried desperately to save them, while the chief medical officer walked among them like an angel of death determining who could be saved and who would have to be ignored. Sydney was down there, helping move the wounded to the cleared area, her lovely form already stained with the blood of others. Bromley turned his back on the carnage and returned to his Wraith. He didn't doubt the wisdom of the High Chancellor or Grand Commander or whatever the hell Grandeur was calling himself these days, nor did he doubt senior officers like General Osborn or Grand Admiral Stanford, he did however doubt some of the officers in naval command under the Grand Admiral. Bromley put aside these thoughts as he flew off into the sky and headed back to the main base to make his report as an experienced officer on his opinion about the attack.

On another part of Dinosaur Planet there was a bustle of activity of another kind. Construction machines and legions of engineers were scurrying around the large beach and forested cliffs of the area known by the locals as Cape Claw. Throughout the organized chaos a dark figure rode a small, wheeled vehicle up one of the roads that cut through the forest, past a half constructed concrete wall and several squads of patrolling soldiers, and pulled to a stop at the edge of the cliff. Although the armies of Dinosaur Planet had been crushed within a few days the survivors had resorted to guerilla warfare and formed a resistance that was more troublesome than many officers were willing to admit.

 Lieutenant Borodin stepped out of the vehicle and walked down one of the ramps that led down from the cliff to down to the concrete platform and entered through the strange, mask shaped entrance.  His black uniforms and black berets marked him as a member of the BMI, Brotherhood Military intelligence. The hordes of engineers and workers gave him a wide berth because while the main task of the BMI was to gather intelligence and data it was no secret that they also doubled as a kind of secret police responsible for silencing anyone who ever got a little too talkative on the wrong subjects. Fortunately for the engineers he was here for the former rather than the later, to inspect the progress of the half constructed mines that were being built. He were escorted down through ancient rooms filled with statues of creatures in cloaks and wearing masks that resembled the entrance, and through modern equipment filled mine shafts until they arrived at a truly impressive room that was dominated by a large structure in the middle where four pulsating stones rested. After an analysis of the ancient records and a thorough interrogation of the locals the Brotherhood scientists had decided that it would probably be a very bad idea to try and move the four stones, so the engineers had left them where they were.

Lieutenant Borodin liked the aurora of power his position provided him though it got in the way sometimes, the fact was he simply liked being feared. He adjusted his sunglasses as he followed his somewhat nervous guide through a large hydraulic door and into a room filled with lockers and rows of HAZMAT and bio suits hanging on racks along the walls. When finished the elevators that would descend from this room would have to pass through an airlock and a magnetic decontamination field, as sensor scans of the area below showed intense radiation, no doubt generated by the substance the Brotherhood sought, but never actually seen. Borodin followed the engineer through another airlock into a large room that was dominated by a sealed cargo lift shaft sticking up from the floor and going on up through the ceiling. It would carry sealed barrels of the substance that had been code-named tiberon to the surface where a refinery and processing center had already been constructed, and from there processed and purified tiberon would be sent to a large research facility connected to the refinery by a large sealed pipeline through which the tiberon would be sent. Everything appeared to be on schedule and if no problems occurred mining would begin in a little over a week, the brass would be pleased with the news.

High Chancellor Grandeur was a happy man; everything was going exactly as planned. Dinosaur Planet was theirs, the planets that the inhabitants of this galaxy called Titania, and Macbeth had also fallen to his armies, Fortuna was already under heavy attack and would fall within days, and his forces were preparing to move against the volcanic planet known as Venom, three planets had fallen in just over a month. Even better than all of this reports indicated that science teams had already taken samples of the substance that had recently been code-named tiberon and reported that it did indeed have many intriguing properties. Soon mining would begin and he would be able to use the substance to achieve his ultimate goal. The comm. on his desk beeping brought him out of his reverie.

"And as I said we didn't expect the Cornerians to put such determined resistance."

            The comment brought Grandeur's attention back to the commanders seated in front of him.

            "But they have been driven from the planet and are now on the run?"

            "Yes my leader they are indeed, but the attack proved very costly." General Osborn replied.

"We must now hurry and take advantage of their weakness by attacking them in full force at their capital." Lovell said, though nobody else seemed to agree.

"No now is not the time, we will wait until our fleet and ground forces have regrouped and until the terra forming and construction down there is farther along. Now are there any concerns with this plan."

Grandeur looked around the room as if daring anyone to speak up, as usually Grand Admiral Stanford ignored the warning and gave his opinion.

"With all do respect my leader I fear that with our armies already occupying three planets and all ready invading a fourth two more large scale attacks may spread our forces too thinly."

If this questioning of his plan angered Grandeur he didn't show it.

            "Not to worry admiral. For one thing the enemy does not know of this, and for another I am told that our forces will soon be finished digging in on the planets we already control and will be better suited to fending off counterattacks."

When Stanford didn't speak Grandeur continued.

"Now I am also told that two individuals among the Cornerian army are becoming troublesome."

"Yes my leader, two vulpines who are racking up kills on our forces a little too quickly and are even said to have infiltrated our field base down there, we have already offered reward to the unit who brings them in alive or dead and provided pictures of them to every soldier."

 "Then we must raise the reward and make examples of those careless enough to allow them to infiltrate our base."

The assembled commanders all nodded and a moment later, the troublesome pair forgotten began to discuss the best strategies for the invasions of Venom and Corneria.

Grandeur leaned back a little and scratched his head, most of the complicated battle plans and fleet maneuvers beyond his comprehension. Two strands of blue fur fell onto his desk.        

            It was evening by the time Bromley returned from delivering his report to command. Sydney was waiting in his quarters, and for a brief moment he wondered how she'd gotten in.

"My shower's broken."

Bromley looked at her clean body, she couldn't have cleaned with a shower, he smiled.

"You can use mine."

The cheetah woman smiled mischievously.

"I don't know, I think the knob is jammed."

            Bromley entered the bathroom and turned the shower knob, the shower turned on with no problems. Without warning Sydney threw her arms around him and their muzzles locked together. Sydney thrust her tongue toward the back of Bromley's mouth and he could feel her warm breath flowing down his throat. The feel of her wonderful body pressed against his, her large, sexy breasts pressed against his chest, and the feel of her tongue in his mouth was all it took for the hormones to take over. Finally their muzzles broke apart and the two lovers gasped for breath. Sydney began to strip off her uniform. Bromley walked over and shut the bathroom door, before disrobing and following her into the shower; their passion saturated the air more than the steam from the shower.

            On the barren plains of Titania a long line of hapless Cornerian colonist and POWs were herded off the transports that had brought them here from the temporary prison they'd spent the last week in, and through the gates of a large prison camp. They were sullen and walked with little hope in their steps, the guards at the prison had already told them what kind of things to expect at this place. It was only one of several that had been set up on the barren deserts of this god-forsaken world. The soldiers who stood in the guard towers or marched alongside the group looked on them as they might look on someone going to his execution. A large building situated in the northwest corner of the camp towered over all the others. It was an imposing structure that sported towering smoke stacks, it was not a factory.


	14. The Home Front

General Pepper began to pace as he listened to the reports of casualties suffered during the campaign on Dinosaur Planet and the subsequent retreat of all ground and space forces. The general drew a small pipe from his pocket and lit it not really giving a damn at the moment for the military regulations forbidding smoking inside or near any important command area. He inhaled a puff of smoke and tried to savor its calming effect. The invasions from Andross' Venomian armies, the narrowly averted crisis on Dinosaur Planet, and now yet another army bent on taking over this blasted system had decided to rear its ugly head. Pepper sighed, if the direct effects of some war or another didn't kill him then the sheer stress eventually would. With another sigh he turned to Whitcomb.

"           Enough, file the rest of the casualties in a report or something, what is the overall status of the hostile invasion right now?"

"Dinosaur Planet, Titania, and Macbeth have fallen, Fortuna and Venom are under heavy attack, and I'm afraid that all of our listening post on the outer rim of the system have gone silent. Unfortunately this isn't the bad news, our listening outpost have detected multiple energy signatures and comm. chatter at the edge of Sector X to suggest that a Brotherhood fleet is massing, we believe that their target is Katina.

General Pepper's pacing seemed to quicken just a little.

"Hmmm, we must withdraw our troops from Fortuna."

"Sir… with all do respect is it wise to surrender Fortuna to the enemy?"

"We have no choice, if a Brotherhood fleet is massing for another major push then we have to fall back and dig in. We will pull the remaining four hundred or so troops, two hundred will be sent to Katina, the remaining two hundred will be pulled back to Corneria to supplement the ground forces we already have here."

Whitcomb nodded, but as soon as Pepper's back was to him again grimaced. Pulling back to the very gates, this war had been going on a little more than a month and it had already come to this. Whitcomb shook his head and began to issue the necessary orders.

The mess hall was nearly empty, only one group of anthros sat around a table in a corner. It was the first time the old crew had been together since the beginning of the war, Fox thought as he chewed on a piece of some kind of steak. Krystal sat beside and was presently gnawing on a roasted leg of some domesticated herd animal or another. With the vast majority of the species enlisted in the Cornerian army being carnivorous it should come as no surprise that ninety percent of what they served was an equally diverse assortment of meats. Across from her Falco and Katt were deep in conversation. Well almost together, Bill was in a hospital after taking a particularly nasty blast of radiation when one of his Arwing's wings had been blown of by a narrowly avoided pair of missiles and he'd gotten a little too close to the engine exhaust ports of a Brotherhood cruiser. Peppy was watching over the Great Fox, while Slippy was probably to busy tinkering with something to come. Even if it would be over all too soon and even though not everyone was here, it felt good to have the old group together for a little while. The next time they all got a chance to just sit down and swap stories about various battles over a sit down meal might be a while.

Sergeant Stevenson stood on a balcony staring out over Cornerian City, the place he loved so much and had fought so hard for over the years. Sometimes in his nightmares he could still see the horror of the Venomian invasion, the destruction of so much he had loved, the deaths of many of his comrades, the death of his brother. His brother had become one of the countless other soldiers who fought the unrelenting Venomian war machine and had made the ultimate sacrifice in the service of his people, and like many others his only funeral pyre had been a Venomian carpet-bombing. Sure they were allies now but the bastards might turn on them any moment for all he knew or cared. Not many surviving people knew just how much he had sacrificed for the cause, during one of the battles for Cornerian during the war with Venomians he'd been hit with an Ion beam and most of his nervous system had been completely fried. A fellow soldier had dragged his limp and paralyzed body from the battlefield only to be killed by a sniper, another debt Stevenson would someday pay. He still didn't know how the medics had been able to save him, but they said a big part of it had been his sheer will to live. He looked up at the stars and with a practiced eye could pick out Fortuna and Katina, Aquas glowed with a gentle blue, almost like a serpents eye, Venom was visible, glowing crimson with its volcanic activity. Many planets had already been engulfed in fierce battles and waves of bloodshed, the flood of violence that swept through the Lylat System in a great tide of doom and threatened to eclipse everything he and others like him stood for. Gentle breeze began to blow past the balcony, soon the Brotherhood would come for them here, he could feel it. It was already too late for his life to ever be salvaged and he knew it, but it was not too late for others. Stevenson turned and headed for the winding path of stair and streets that would eventually take him back to the Cornerian military base.

            Another crate landed in the on the stack with a satisfying thud.

            "Hey watch it buddy, that stuff's fragile."

            Wolf O'Donnell turned and fixed the unfortunate worker with a stare that would've melted concrete until he turned away.

            Whatever happened to the days of soaring through space in his old Wolfen 3, getting into furious dogfights and the occasional good old fashioned bar fight. What had happened, ha he'd taken that cursed job from that giant deranged monkey head, gotten himself into an unfavorable position, and then gotten shot down and almost killed above the volcanic wastelands of that god forsaken planet Venom. As much as he felt he should he didn't really blame McCloud, he blamed Andross. He'd let himself be lured in by a few too many zeros in the reward and look where it had gotten him, a lowly freight handler at a Cornerian spaceport. Pigma hadn't survived the crash, Andrew was probably dead even though he had never gone back to check for sure, he'd never liked that whining little monkey. Leon had been alive and had been critical to getting off of Venom. An impressive array of scars and a biomechanical hand bore testament to how well that went. Wherever Leon was though Wolf was sure he was doing fine, probably better than him at the moment. Wolf hefted another crate and tossed it into the pile, not quite smiling at the sound of glass breaking inside or the resigned look on his fellow worker's face, awww one of the few pleasures left in life.

            The sound of warning alarms blaring startled General Pepper from where he'd dozed of in a command chair.

            "What was that!"

            "Sir our listening post report the Brotherhood fleet has is moving out, they have just passed the through the former Vulgarian shipping lane and are passing through Fortunan space. They should arrive at Katina in… wait they're changing course!"

            General Pepper sighed, knew he wasn't going to like this but asked the question anyway.

            "What is their new course?"

            "They're coming about onto course One-Five-Zero-Seven, they're headed here, ETA seven minutes!"

            By this time alarms began to sound but the command crew remained quiet and relatively calm, they'd seen all this before.

            "Sound a planet wide alert, tell all personnel to prepare for combat, get fighters in the air, and warm up the anti-orbital batteries."

            Here they were, once again an enemy at his doorstep, he was about to roll out the welcome mat.


	15. Enemy at the Gate: Part 1

Captain Whitcomb stared out the main view port where a sizable fleet of Brotherhood warships were roaring towards him as they decelerated from hyperspace, and even though they were too far away to see he knew hundreds of weapons batteries were swinging towards his fleet.

            "All ships fire at will."

The room began to vibrate with a deep, reassuring hum as a storm of crimson and emerald laser blasts flashed by the view port towards the oncoming enemy, Whitcomb shielded his eyes as the Brotherhood fleet returned fire. The Brotherhood fleet accelerated like an army of medieval warriors charging into battle. A cascade of energy coursed over the ship's hull as a barrage of heavy turbo laser blasts slammed into the Defender's bow shields.

            "Shield crews shift seventy-five percent shield power to the forward projectors."

            "Sir General Pepper is demanding to speak to you immediately."

Whitcomb began shouting almost before the hologram fully materialized.

            "General sir there's too many enemy warships, I need a full barrage from the anti-orbital guns along the leading edges of the Brotherhood armada, my people are already sending the targeting data to the command station!"

            "Calm down Captain the anti-orbital guns are already charging. I will give you any aid I can but you must not let them get past you no matter what the cost."

            The comm. uplink was terminated and Captain Whitcomb turned back towards the rest of the command crew as a shield breach alarm began to sound.

            "Get ready to attack the Brotherhood fleet along the flanks that the AO batteries damage!"

A barrage of massive cerulean energy beams arced up from Corneria and tore into the Brotherhood fleet, punching through shields and piercing armor platting, several Brotherhood ships began to go into a lazy, uncontrolled role while several more were torn apart by chains of explosions along their lateral lines. Whitcomb cursed as the explosions ceased and more Brotherhood ships plowed unrelentingly through the debris, it wasn't enough. Another alarm began blaring… a proximity alarm?

Whitcomb caught a glimpse of at least a dozen of what appeared to be some kind of transport ships materializing from hyperspace barely a hundred meters from a group of Cornerian warships. The first ship slammed into the battle cruiser Sentinel, and as he watched Whitcomb could see the battle cruiser's bow crumpling back as the transport slammed into it at just under light speed. The battle cruiser vanished in a fire ball as a second transport hit it midship while the warships around it suffered similar fates, the enemy was using kamikaze techniques? The proximity alarms blared again and another group of ships materialized in the hole that been torn in the Cornerian fleet.

            "Sir we have two heavy cruisers and two assault carriers dropping out of hyperspace."

            "All ships fire, fire don't let them get through!"

It was too late. Even as a swarm of Cornerian warships converged on the small armada swarms of fighters and dropships were tearing out of the ship's hangers entering the atmosphere.

"Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!"

Even as Whitcomb was venting his anger the Brotherhood ships were maneuvering towards the hole in the Cornerian defenses even as Cornerian ships rushed to fill it and flurries of turbo laser blasts from the AO guns stabbed into the Brotherhood fleet in an attempt to push them back.

            Sergeant Stevenson rushed out of his barracks as a platoon of Cornerian marines ran by and was almost run over by a light wheeled vehicle that was speeding towards the city. As he ran to where his own unit was assembling at the gate a deafening air raid siren drew his attention to the sky. Hundreds of fiery lines were burning there way through the blue Cornerian sky, the telltale signs of ships coming in steep, the Brotherhood was here.

            General Pepper began to pace again, growing more and more nervous as the reports continued to come in.

            "Tell all civilians to report to shelters immediately, scramble all available fighters, and make sure that all available ground forces are deploying."

            "Sir the Brotherhood ships are coming into range of the AAA grid."

            "Than what are you waiting for Lieutenant, give the order and send them all straight to hell!"

            As General Pepper turned to the view screen-lined wall a storm of energy blasts and SAMs began to lance upward into the sky, shattering Brotherhood Wraiths and tearing through rows of bombers and dropships. As he watched the formation of aircraft broke up and scattered across the sky like some aquatic predator spreading its tentacles. Wraiths and bombers broke up into squadrons and screamed toward the surface to begin attack runs while the dropships broke into smaller groups and blazed toward the surface to deposit their cargos. God damn it where were the fighters.

            At the Cornerian Air Defense base swarms of Broadsword fighters were taking to the skies, blazing out of their hangers to join their brothers already in the air. A pair of Arwings blazed out of hanger and screamed down the runway before pulling up and soaring up into the sky to join the swarm.

            As Fox slid his Arwing into formation with the rest Broadswords he stared out at the oncoming enemy. It brought back bad memories to see the Cornerian sky full of hostile starfighters. General Pepper's voice crackled over the comm. as the massive cloud of incoming Brotherhood ships loomed closer.

            "Attention all fighters, protect the anti-orbital batteries at all costs, any Brotherhood aircraft attacking these batteries are to be considered primary targets, secondary targets are the Brotherhood dropships and bombers. All other aircraft are to be considered tertiary targets and should only be engaged if all other targets are eliminated."

There was a pause and then the general shouted an old Cornerian battle cry.

"For your people comrades, do not turn your back on them!"

            Fox reached over and activated his targeting computer knowing Krystal would be doing the same, and Bill and Falco for that matter… wherever they were. As if on cue Bills voice crackled over the comm.

            "All fighters, fire your missiles and bombs on my mark, three, two, one, fire at will!"

            The fuselages of countless Broadswords seemed to spout fire as swarms of air-to-air missiles and nova star bombs were fired at the incoming Brotherhood fighters, shattering Wraiths, ripping apart dropships, and tearing chunks from bombers. A swarm of lights flared at the edge of Fox's vision as the Brotherhood returned fire with their own missiles. Seconds later the two swarms of fighters collided and the battle devolved into a massive, chaotic dogfight.

            "Break off into squadrons and engage the enemy as ordered!"

            Fox fired a nova star bomb into a swarm of Wraiths as a hail of laser blasts tore apart the squadron of Broadswords in front of him, sending them spiraling down to crash into the very city they sought to defend. He spun his Arwing into a tight roll to unleash a burst of laser fire on a trio of attacking Wraiths. He rolled to port and put a charge shot up an enemy fighter's exhaust port and without waiting to admire his handwork rolled to starboard and blew a wing off another unfortunate Wraith. His HUD flashed a warning and he jammed down on the stick, an enemy air-to-air missile sailing over him before its targeting systems could acquire him. A Wraith settled onto his six and laser bolts flashed by his Arwing, some mere meters from the canopy as he jinked left and right before doing a barrel role to starboard and jamming the stick back. His vision clouded for a brief moment as his gravity compensator struggled to keep him from blacking out from the sheer G force of the maneuver. He spun his Arwing around and caught the enemy Wraith flat-footed, sending it down to dig its own grave in the streets of Cornerian City. Fox caught a glimpse Krystal's blue and gold striped Arwing blaze by in pursuit of another Wraith and barely dove in time to avoid a burning Broadsword. An anonymous pilot's voice crackled on the comm.

            "Heads up, more bogeys coming in steep at two-o'clock!"

            Fox glanced in that direction to find a second cloud of Wraiths screaming into the fray with lasers blazing and rolled hard to port to avoid a hail of laser blasts as the comm. suddenly began blaring cries for help, pilots shouting that their wing mates had been hit, and death screams. Something inside him screamed for him to break left, the kind of uncanny sixth sense that only the most experienced fighter pilots ever felt. Without thinking he jammed the stick to the left as a mass of superheated plasma missed his starboard wing by mere meters, suddenly the Wraith that had fired the shot burst into flames. Another Arwing flew through the explosion, Falco.

            "Heads up we got another group of bandits at four-o'clock!"

            Fox hazarded a look in the direction the pilot had said, the clouds seemed to part as a swarm of Wraiths and Brotherhood bombers came screaming in flying in perfect formation, some with their hulls still glowing slightly from the steep dive into the atmosphere. A flight of Broadswords rose to appose them only to plowed under by the sheer number of hostiles as the swarm of Brotherhood ships entered a steep dive toward one of the AO installations. Walls of laser blasts and SAMs arced up to greet them reaching for the ships with fiery fingers as the installations AAA gunners desperately tried to protect the massive gun turret mounted on a pedestal in the middle of the small base. The Wraiths hit first drawing fire away from the bombers, generating the ear-splitting screaming sound as they dove that gave the starfighter its name. They swoop in through walls of Cornerian AA fire while countless numbers of their wing mates vanished in balls of fire or spiraled down to their final resting places in Cornerian City. In unison the swarm of Wraiths opened fire with their lasers and missile launchers tearing apart gun turrets and SAM sites before pulling up and blazing off over the city. The bombers screamed in on their steep dives and doors on the bellies opened, releasing long lines of wicked looking bombs. The bombs slammed into the massive AO gun and it seemed for a moment to collapse in on itself before shattering in a massive fireball.

            "God help us."

Fox heard himself say out loud as he grimly returned his attention to the dogfight.


	16. Enemy at the Gate: Part 2

            Sergeant Stevenson tightened his grip on one of the metal bars running across ceiling but just below the canvass cover of the flatbed troop truck as the driver swerved to avoid the burning wreck of a Cornerian Broadsword fighter laying in the street and gunned the engine again. Scattered on the street behind and in front of his vehicle several more flatbed trucks, light vehicles, and an APC raced down the street. The small column of vehicles began to shed speed in an empty, open area of the Cornerian highway, and where the line of buildings met the road he could see a group of fallen Cornerian and Brotherhood soldiers with the sound of weapons fire coming from beyond the buildings. Almost before the column had come to a full stop Stevenson began shouting orders.

            "Pile out marines, go, go, go, set up a perimeter!"

            The green clad marines swarmed across the street and began to fan out around the buildings while pairs of marines lugged several heavy tripod guns into the buildings. Stevenson and his squad sprinted around one of the buildings and nearly collided with a battered squad of marines headed the other way, several carrying wounded comrades. Stevenson stepped in front of canine corporal with a nasty wound on his left shoulder.

            "What's going on over there marine?"

            "Sir, we had two platoons of soldiers that were moving in to secure this area when command picked up a large group of Brotherhood coming down in the area. We were engaging about two squads of enemy paratroopers when we got hit from hard on are left flank by at least three more squads of hostiles, we took some heavy casualties and our Lieutenant got hit as we were pulling back. The rest of the unit is still back there, but we don't know how many hostiles there are now."

            "Our vehicles are back that way waiting to evacuate wounded, have everyone leave us some spare ammo before getting out of here, the rest of you get ready to go in there and give our guys a hand. Simons head back up to those buildings and make sure that the rest of the marines have finished setting up defensive positions up there. Tucker head back to the insertion point and bring another squad down here. Everyone else follow me, we're going in!"

            Sergeant Stevenson followed the sounds of the weapons fire down an alley and past a row of parked hover cars sitting next to a concrete wall. As he dashed through an entryway in the wall he instinctively ducked his head as a burst of blaster bolts tore into the concrete less than a meter from his body. He dove behind another parked hover car before sticking his head up and laying down covering fire as the rest of his squad charged through the entrance and found cover of their own. Only when the rest of his team was safely behind cover did he allow himself the luxury of surveying his surroundings. He was on a large boulevard, with plenty of parked hover cars, metal trashcans, and lots of other good objects to use for cover. A row of trees had been planted on both sides of the street and at the moment both groups were using them the cover they offered to their advantage. From where he was he could see a squad of Cornerian soldiers hiding behind everything from street benches to hover cars, surrounded by their fallen comrades and numerous wounded. On the other side of the street at least thirty or forty Brotherhood soldiers were pummeling his men and the other squad of marines. On his command his troops hurled grenades in unison and began laying down suppressing fire on the enemy troops and as Stevenson watched, knots of hostiles were torn apart by grenades or riddled with bullets or blaster bolts. Unfortunately his men began to fall in quick succession as the Brotherhood troops returned fire. He crawled over to where a feline marine wearing a sergeant's insignia was laying down fire on a pair of Brotherhood soldiers. Stevenson glanced at the name printed on the back of the soldier's helmet.

            "Sergeant Perez, I'm Sergeant Stevenson, what can we do to help?"

            The other marine ducked back behind cover and turned towards him.

            "We need to pull back and regroup and to get our wounded out of here, can your men lay down enough covering fire to get the job done?"

            As if on cue the squad Stevenson had sent Tucker to fetch arrived and began to fan out and get behind cover. To Stevenson's delight two marines were lugging a metal box behind a hover car and hurriedly began to set up the heavy tripod gun it contained.

            "We can give you enough cover but not for very long against this many hostiles, tell your men that as soon as they start to hear organized bursts of weapons fire to head for the entryway and run like hell, the rest of our team has dug in some of those buildings back that way."

            Sergeant Perez nodded and bellowed the necessary orders, his troops disengaged and got ready to move. Perez nodded to Stevenson and he turned and gave the order.

            "Friendly's moving out covering fire!"

            Stevenson raised his assault rifle and emptied the clip in the direction of the Brotherhood soldiers while both of his squads let loose a hail of blaster bolts and bullets, trying desperately to keep the Brotherhood soldier's heads down long enough. Sergeant Perez's squad moved out carrying, helping or dragging the wounded through the entryway while their squad members joined the fire against the Brotherhood paratroopers. When the last of Perez's squad was through the opening the second squad under Stevenson's command sprinted for the opening while the sergeant's group covered them before sprinting through it themselves, unfortunately nobody was covering them and as he sprinted back past the row of parked hover cars by the wall and toward the alley Stevenson heard several screams as his squad lost several more soldiers. He couldn't stop for them now, the Brotherhood soldiers were no doubt in pursuit by now and he had to get back to the rest of the company.

            General Pepper rubbed his aching eyes and looked back at the main view screen. Another AO battery had been lost and be it from being destroyed, running out of missiles, or finally overheating their power generators the weapons of the AAA grid were slowly beginning to fall silent. His fighters were at the moment still holding their own against the Brotherhood fighters, but there were just too many Wraiths in the air for very many of his own fighters to go after the Brotherhood bombers or dropships. On the view screen another wave of Brotherhood bombers flew in and began to carpet bomb the city. Pepper sighed and pressed a button on the command table, switching the view to where a group of Brotherhood dropships and a pair of light assault transports were touching down in an open area of the city unloading battalion after battalion of infantry and releasing probably every kind of assault vehicle his forces had encountered so far and a few they hadn't. He turned to one of the technicians working busily at a command console.

            "Status report!"

            "Sir Brotherhood aircraft are slowly overrunning our air defense zones and we have squadrons of dropships already slipping the kill zone. The entire northeast section of Cornerian City is wall to wall fire fights."

            General Pepper walked over the holo table at the center of the war room and stared down at it. The sky above the city was a chaotic cloud of darting colored shapes and symbols. He looked at the miniature recreation of the city itself were an equally chaotic mass of symbols clashed in the northeast section with the occasional skirmish in other sections. At the edge of the northeast section a mass of red symbols was expanding outward from an area that had been carpet bombed into the ground, that had to be the landing site.

            "Lieutenant gather all forces not engaged in combat and have them set up defensive positions along the edge of this area here, and have get at least a full battalion of armor to attack the Brotherhood forces here and try to divide their ground forces, that should buy us a little more time."

            "Yes General!"

            Sergeant Stevenson ducked back from the window as a stream of metal bullets shot through where he had just been and tore holes in the wall behind him. He hit the clip release, slammed a fresh clip into his assault rifle, pulling the charging lever as a blaster bolt zipped through the window. The Brotherhood had them outnumbered but just barely and his troops had better positions. As he put a burst of gunfire into a Brotherhood soldier who had been moving to a better position he heard a loud combination of rumbling and rattling, and uttered a curse under his breath. The front of a building across the way suddenly exploded and the steel bulk of a Brotherhood tank rolled through the gap, its machine guns already blazing as the turret turned towards one of the buildings his troops were in. A rocket lanced out from one of the buildings, deforming the base of the turret but it was too late the tank gun roared and sent a hundred twenty millimeter shell slamming into the building, blowing a sizable hole and causing the one of the floors on top of it to come crashing down. As two more rockets slammed into the tank and blew it to pieces a second, third, fourth, and fifth tank rolled onto the street and opened fire. Stevenson ducked back and opened one of the pockets on his uniform pulling out a ten-pound brick of explosives. He set the timer for four seconds and threw with all his strength. The brick spun end over end through the air and landed among a cluster of Brotherhood soldiers who desperately tried to dive away from it but weren't quite fast enough. The bomb went off and reduced the soldiers to smears of blood and small junks of charred bone. As Stevenson pressed his body against the wall a phosphate grenade bounced into the window next to his, went off, and began to burn through the face of the Cornerian marine crouching there. Stevenson dashed over to the soldier and drew his combat knife.

            "God damn it marine hold still!"

            Another marine held the soldier down while Sergeant Stevenson began to cut away the smoldering fur and skin on the left side of the soldier's face, if he survived that would be a pretty nasty scar he'd have. As one of the units medics helped the wounded marine to safety Stevenson leaned over the fallen communication specialist and pulled the receiver unit from the marine's backpack then picked a datapad and began to calculate his position.

            "Come in command, this Sergeant Stevenson of D Company. We are taking heavy fire in sector three at coordinates five-nine-two-seven and have enemy armor bearing down on us. Send air support ASAP!"

            Fox went hard to port and dodged a burst of laser fire from another Wraith. He swung around and shook the starfighter from his tail, coming up on the tail of another Wraith. As the fighter began to jink Fox put a burst of laser fire up the fighter's exhaust port. As he swung to starboard to avoid a burning Broadsword a message came in over the command channel.

"Come in command, this Sergeant Stevenson of D Company. We are taking heavy fire in sector three at coordinates five-nine-two-seven and have enemy armor bearing down on us. Send air support ASAP!"

Fox keyed his comm. to the Starfox team's frequency.

"Krystal, you hear that."

"I did Fox, we have to help them."

"I know, I know, form up on me we're going in."

            As Fox broke away from the battle and brought his Arwing in low over Cornerian City his sensor homed in the coordinates.

            "Sergeant Stevenson this is Captain Fox McCloud of the Starfox team, there's too much activity down there, can you get a sensor beacon to guide our bombs in?"

            "Roger Captain, throwing beacon now."

            "There's our target Krys!"

            A pulsing target symbol appeared on Fox's HUD. He pressed a few buttons and the target lock tone sounded as his targeting sensors locked on to the beacon. Fox pulled a trigger on the stick and a pair of Novastar bombs exploded from the launch tubes of both Arwings and slammed into the target Stevenson had designated. A sizable fireball boiled up as the bombs exploded and tore apart the tanks and troops, and shattered the buildings that Brotherhood soldiers had been hiding in.

            "Your all clear sarge we're heading back to the battle."

            "Roger McCloud see back at base."


	17. Shattered Skies

            Grand Admiral Stanford stood on the bridge of his flagship the Devastator scowling down at the green and blue planet that hung in front of him with an armada of enemy capitol ships surrounding it. He hadn't expected the Cornerians to be able to offer up such a fierce and determined resistance, but none could stand against the might of the Brotherhood in the end. His ships had already opened up several holes in the enemy lines through which dropships and fighters were pouring through at regular intervals to join their comrades in the equally hard fought battles down on the planets surface. He turned from the view port and walked over to the holo table that displayed the locations of his units as wells as enemy units. He'd always found it interesting how much the table resembled a much more detailed version of a holo chess board, as if war was nothing more then a gigantic chess game with the pieces being living soldiers and the prize being much more that mere pride. General Osborn joined him at the command table and didn't appear very happy.

            "How goes the ground battle general?"

            "Not as well as expected Grand Admiral but still roughly on schedule. The Cornerians have been able to block our advances at several points but do not have the manpower to cover every area we could advance through. Unfortunately a problem has arisen. The Cornerian military has launched a sizable offensive and has punched a hole in our lines, they are headed for the landing site."

            "Don't worry General they won't make it."

            Osborn bristled slightly at being so easily put aside but made an obvious attempt to hide it; as far as Stanford was concerned he might as well not have tried especially since the general's skin was taking on a red tinge. Stanford turned back towards the holo table.

"Three flights of fighters consisting of three squadrons each will converge on the city at this point and begin more bombing runs and engage any enemy fighters in the air, while one of our corvettes will take up a position deep within the planets atmosphere and assist in bombarding the city. We would take considerable losses if we tried to storm any of the military bases within the enemy controlled sector of the city, but if we keep them under a constant artillery bombardment and use the classic strategy of depriving them of sleep and working their nerves before we attack then our losses will be much less."

            Osborn scratched his scaly chin as he considered what seemed like a pretty sound plan.

            "Yes I agree. If we could acquire and maintain control of the skies than we could position our artillery and move our troops at will while the Cornerians would be forced to either remain within the safety of their own sector or would have to skulk in the shadows within their own city. More than a little ironic isn't it?"

            "Yes, not only that but there would be no way that they could move any heavy mechanized units or aircraft in our sector without bringing our air force down on their heads."

            "What of the biochemical agent that the science junkies promised us?"

            "According to the reports, a mining complex for some kind of radioactive and highly unstable substance has been completed and experiments with this substance that has been code-named tiberion have been promising."

            "All this was in the reports?"

            Stanford smiled.

            "No of course not, but I know certain people, have certain contacts. How do you think I would still be alive if I wasn't always one step ahead of those political bastards?"

            "Speaking of politicians have you noticed Grandeur's growing interest in actual tactics?"

            "What do you mean?"

            "Six months ago he wouldn't have givena damn however the hell we did things as long as we got things done quickly and his secret little police force assured him we knew what we were doing. But a few weeks ago he came up with an actual plan that sounded like it actually might have a chance that it could work."

            "What are you saying?"

            "I don't really know what it means, but since when does a politician of any kind take an interest in the military?"

            The coyote Grand Admiral seemed to shiver for a moment and said more to himself than to Osborn.

            "Indeed what does this mean?"

            Sergeant Stevenson was standing at the back of the light vehicle or called LRV by some and swung the mounted chain gun around to unleash a hail of hot lead on another squad of a squad of Brotherhood soldiers, mowing down several while the rest dove for cover. Behind the vehicle he was riding in five more LRVs, two flatbed trucks, and two APCs raced down the ravaged streets in the wake of a battalion of Cornerian tanks. Personally he would rather be on foot with the rest of his unit back in the area where they'd secured the buildings, but no the officers had pulled him temporarily they had said from his old unit and stuck him here, in a unit that was racing right for their deaths. A group of Brotherhood soldiers stuck their heads and weapons out from several windows on buildings on either side of the street only to have them blown off. A pair of Brotherhood LAVs raced up from back alleys with machine guns blazing and succeeded in blowing out the armored tires of one the light vehicles, sending it careening into an abandoned store on the side of the road before they too succumbed to the hail of high caliber bullets from the other LRVs. As the vehicles turned a corner Brotherhood soldiers popped out from windows and rooftops and the Cornerians suddenly found themselves racing through a hail of bullets and blaster bolts. A second LRV was hit by a rocket and blew to pieces while a third was riddled by enemy fire and with its crew dead crashed into a street corner. Stevenson held down the trigger and sprayed the Brotherhood soldiers with bullets sending scores of them falling from the rooftops to the street below and generally keeping the survivor's heads down. A Brotherhood APC rolled up from a side road and opened fire with its own heavy chain gun while a soldier popped up from a hatch and aimed a rocket launcher at one of the passing Cornerian APCs. Just as the soldier had lined up his target he was hit by burst of blaster fire from one of the flatbed trucks and launched the rocket off into the sky while his blood spattered onto the top of the APC. The Brotherhood vehicle surged forward as its gunner suffered a similar fate.

            "Look out, the bastards are gonna ram!"

Too late, the armored vehicle slammed into the flatbed truck, sending it rolling off the road and slamming into a concrete wall before the APC was hit by a flurry of rockets from the rest of the Cornerian vehicles. As the vehicles turned another corner the enemy fire stopped and for a moment Stevenson thought they'd broken through the enemy lines. Then the vehicles encountered a roadblock and his blood went cold as he heard a familiar whining sound. A Brotherhood Banshee hovered up over one of the buildings and its nose-mounted cannon sent a storm of high-powered laser blasts screamin down on the column of vehicles. The LRV swerved like a thing possessed before flipping and going into a roll as a flurry of the laser blast slammed into the vehicle, Stevenson hit the ground hard as the LRV crashed into the roadblock. A Cornerian APC vanished in a fireball as the Banshee unleashed its rocket pods. A blizzard of bullets and blaster bolts slammed into the aircraft, bouncing and pinging off its armor before rocket soldier got a lucky shot on the Banshee's starboard hover turbine and sent it spiraling out of sight again, a moment later the rumble of an explosion was heard. A marine bearing a lieutenant's insignia hopped out of the surviving APC.

"What are you waiting for you bastards, get out and climb over that roadblock, vehicle crews try and find a way around and meet us somewhere on the other side!"

Stevenson hauled himself to his feet and pulled his assault rifle from its place on his back as the rest of the marines charged past and clambered over the roadblock.

            As Wolf O'Donnell sprinted down the alley another burst of blaster bolt slammed into a concrete wall behind him.

            "Damn sons of bitches!"

            As if the soldiers chasing him heard the curse a flurry of bullets whizzed by him. Wolf turned a corner and leapt on top of a rusted garbage dumpster then lunged for a particularly deep windowsill, pulling himself up as the soldiers rounded the corner and charged past him. He was about to let out the breath he'd been holding when one of the soldiers stopped running.

            "Hey sarge!"

            The group of soldiers stopped and the one who called out nodded toward the dumpster, a soldier bearing what Wolf assumed was the insignia of a Brotherhood sergeant fired a burst of blaster bolts into the dumpster. A pair of soldiers threw the garbage dumpster's lid open and thrust the muzzles of their weapons inside… to find it empty. The sergeant cursed and the squad started running a little faster down the alley. Wolf finally exhaled, all this trouble just because he'd tried to steal a Brotherhood vehicle?

            The battered lupine dropped back down to the ground and sprinted off in the direction opposite of where the Brotherhood troops had gone. He had to find somewhere safe, but definitely not one of the shelters just sitting around waiting for the enemy to finally come, no definitely not. Oh well he'd think of something.

            General Pepper put the end of the pipe back into his mouth and took another look at the screen. His fighters were now outnumbered at least seven or eight to one and had taken massive casualties.

            "Lieutenant tell all troops not engaged in combat to fall back to point to rally point alpha, and have all troops on our side of the rally point advance and begin setting up defensive lines for our troops to fall back to. Then pull back all fighter squadrons to our sector."

            "We're abandoning the northeast sector sir, and the people in the shelters there?"

            "Are you questioning my order soldier?'

            "But I have family in those shelters!"

            Pepper sighed and rubbed his eyes again.

            "We have no choice Lieutenant. If we don't give up the northeast section and strengthen our hold here than we will suffer the same fate all too quickly. It's for the greater good.

            "We can't leave them!"

            "I said we have no choice soldier."

            The lieutenant stood up.

            "We can't leave them!"

            "Sit down soldier."

            "I can't abandon them, I won't!"

            Pepper rubbed his eyes again. The poor fellow probably wasn't even thinking straight anymore, he'd probably already cracked. Pepper motioned for the guards. As the pair of burly marines dragged the screaming technician from the command center Pepper lit his pipe again. Was this the war that would finally make him crack? The question refused to be put aside as he sat down in his command chair and tried to return his attention to the screens.


	18. Corneria Burning

            Sergeant Stevenson rolled behind a parked hover car and emptied the clip of his assault rifle in the direction of a platoon of Brotherhood soldiers as the rest of the Cornerian marines charged into the street and found cover. The lieutenant fired a burst from his sub machine gun and began bellowing orders.

            "Damn it marines set up a base of fire, and somebody get suppressing fire on that goddamn tripod gun up there!"

            As a trio minigun-wielding Cornerian support gunners unleashed a hail of covering fire the unit broke into two groups and moved to outflank the Brotherhood infantry.

            Stevenson kept his head down as he moved from cover to cover working his way towards the enemy soldiers. Over the sound of the weapons fire he heard the lieutenant bellow another order.

            "Fix bayonets!"

            Stevenson pulled his combat knife from its sheath and slid it onto the muzzle of his rifle.

            "Attack!"

            In unison the swarm of Cornerian marines stood up and opened fire, catching the Brotherhood soldiers in a withering crossfire. As the enemy tried to retroup the Cornerians fell on them from both sides, firing into the faces of their enemies at point blank and howling with bloodlust and hatred for the ones who were burning their home world to the ground. As Stevenson blew a Brotherhood soldier's face in the fighting went hand to hand as the two groups got to close to fire without hitting their comrades. He ducked roundhouse blow from a Brotherhood soldier and drove his bayonet into the soldier's chest. Nearby the Cornerian lieutenant drew a ceremonial saber while the marine in front of him took a Brotherhood combat knife in the face. A voice with a Cornerian accent shouted.

            "Down in front!"

            As Stevenson dropped and landed on his face a roiling column of flaming liquid filled the space he'd just vacated and incinerated the group of Brotherhood soldiers who'd been standing there. The moment the flame trooper stopped firing Stevenson was on his feet again and charged right into the midst of the Brotherhood survivors. Here were the bastards who'd killed so many of his friends and comrades and were burning his home to the ground; it was their day of reckoning. For a moment years seemed to fall away and he was fighting the Venomians again, it wasn't a happy reunion.

            "Look out, more hostiles coming in from the east!"

            Stevenson drove his bayonet through another enemy soldier's face and turned. Another swarm of Brotherhood soldiers were charging down a side road towards them with weapons blazing and bayonets fixed. Stevenson slammed a fresh clip into his weapon and opened fire.

            Krystal stepped out of the room she and Fox had been given by the Cornerian military feeling a lot better than she had when she had entered it. The rigors of the fierce dogfight having been washed away along with the sweat by a warm shower. As she entered the main square of the base where a statue of a trio of stone Cornerian marines stood frozen in a silent salute as they stood triumphantly around a marble flag. The main square of the Cornerian Defense Base was even more crowded than usual and was bustling with civilian refugees. She spotted Fox, Falco, and Katt working their way among the gathering crowd and glaring venomously at a speaker who stood on the raised base of the statue.

            "The Cornerian military is sending your sons and daughters into battles they cannot win. They have ignored offers by the Brotherhood to negotiate peace, and even now are belligerently seeking out the Brotherhood forces on this planet in their mindless warmongering. I represent the Sons of Liberty, and have come to call for your support in this time of strife."

            The speaker gestured to a small group of Cornerian marines who were filling purposely into the square.

            "Even now these traitors to peace come to silence my plea for help and keep you from knowing the truth. Join us and bring an end to this destructive war and restore peace. Bring our children, friends and family home so that we may oomph."

            Bill rubbed his fist as the enraged speaker staggered to his feet and the enraged canine pilot glared down on him. The leader of the small, uniformed group that held the crowd back at the base of the statue turned towards the confrontation. To Krystal they might as well have been wearing flashing neon signs declaring them to be the speaker's followers. The leader of the group raised a hand but Fox materialized from the crowd and placed a hand on his shoulder. As the speaker struggled to regain his composure Bill spat at his feet with uncharacteristic belligerence.

            "You are at best a traitor and at worse a Brotherhood spy, either one is punishable with death. I doubt you've even seen the indiscriminate devastation the Brotherhood has sent raining down on our city, they don't care about collateral damage at all and even seem to welcome it. They're out there killing anyone in their path, military and civilian alike, and when they do take prisoners they have to beat them a few times. Do you honestly think they will ever settle for anything less than complete conquest? It's like they're on a goddamned holocaust. Though I have to give you credit, we do have to band together, but only so we can fight not just them, but bastards like you."

            The speaker bellowed and raised his fist in some kind of hand signal, at that moment his followers at the base of the statue charged at Bill, the supporter that Fox had restrained spun tried to land a right hook on Fox's jaw. His fist struck empty air as the vulpine mercenary dodged behind him and hit him in the back of the head with a left roundhouse. As the crowd scattered Krystal, Falco, and Katt charged into the fray. Krystal dodged a shoulder bash from another one of the grunts and sent him to the floor with a devastating elbow jab-snap kick combo. Falco grabbed another supporter and wrestled him to the ground before bring down another one that had caught Katt in a bear hug. Fox effortlessly dodged a flurry of jabs from another inexperienced supporter and caught him in the stomach with a devastating roundhouse kick before slashing another supporter across the shoulder, claws raking deep furrows. The group of marines suddenly waded into the fight and began very forcefully restraining the handful of the SOFL followers still standing. Bill punched the speaker one last time before the marines dragged him off.

            "That's our answer to your traitorous call."

            General Osborn stepped off the shuttle as the battalion of mortar tanks moved into position on top of the hill outside of Cornerian City. His commanders had reported that the battalion of enemy tanks had finally been stopped, though it had taken a sizable air strike and another battalion of tanks to stop them, and the breached area would soon be secure again. Right now though Osborn was more worried about snipers, but he was wearing the uniform of a common soldier and his troops were following the traditional protocol of not saluting officers in the field so even if there were any he should be safe. The last of the tanks moved into position and in unison the massive artillery cannon mounted on top of each began to slowly elevate and one by one stopped and locked into position. An officer who was defying the field regulations by wearing his full command uniform strode along the row of mortar tanks and shouted an order into the microphone mounted on his shirt collar.

            "Prepare to fire a three hundred shell barrage on your assigned targets, ready!"

            Osborn slipped a pair of sonic dampeners over his ears holes.

            "Fire!"

            Even with the sound-dampening device the roar of the twelve artillery cannons was deafening as the mortar tanks fired, paused, then fired again, sending a hail of one hundred forty millimeter high-explosive shells soaring out over the hills and city trailing long streams of smoke and steam behind them and slamming into distant targets. At this range they probably wouldn't hit anything unless they got lucky but they didn't need to, they just needed to be hitting something in the part of the city still under Cornerian control. Osborn smiled, the siege had begun.


	19. The Shadow has Fallen

            Fox paused and stared out the open hanger doors at the crimson dusk sky, wondering how many Cornerians had already fought and died out there.

"Haven't you finished cleaning those things yet?

            Fox looked over to where Krystal laid with her lovely body sprawled causally on top of her Arwing's nose cone and her tail hanging over the edge. Fox smiled and went along with the charade.

"Your finished cleaning yours so quickly?"

"I've been done for ten minutes."

"If my lasers need more cleaning than I must've killed more enemy fighters."

Krystal grinned mischievously.

            "Maybe you missed."

            It was Fox's turn to grin.

            "Maybe, but I doubt it."

Fox turned as a familiar voice interrupted the game; Bill entered the hanger not looking as cheerful as he sounded.

            "Bill what are you doing here?"

            The canine pilot winced and handed Fox a small stack of official looking document.

            "General Pepper is calling for volunteers to go out on a mission to try and take out those Brotherhood artillery batteries that have been shelling us all day."

            Fox raised an eyebrow.

            "How many volunteers has he gotten to march into the middle of enemy controlled territory without armor or air support and take out a squadron of no doubt heavily guarded enemy artillery batteries?"

            Bill laughed.

            "More than you would think, especially considering the latest addition to the regulation books, which in more diplomatic words of course states that as of now the word 'volunteer' is just another word for draftee."

            "Figures."

            "Yeah, he said you'll find all the details on the mission, the equipment you're supposed to bring, and intel on the area in those docs. The meeting place is outside the number three armory and field equipment storage building which is also where we'll all be getting our equipment. Oh one more thing, he said that the team leaves in three hours."

            "We leave in three hours and we're just being told about this?"

            The canine pilot grinned again.

            "It's part of that fancy 'keep your troops in the dark until the last minute so that the enemy won't find out' doctrine."

            "I never liked that doctrine."

            "Welcome to the club."

            "All right marines, take a five minute break."

            Stevenson fell to one knee and leaned heavily on his weapon, for God's sake how far had they been running. The lieutenant whom Stevenson found that he still didn't even know his name collapsed on top of a pile of rubble and turned his head to the unit's communication specialist.

            "Anders, contact Command, tell them my unit doesn't have the manpower or the support to reach the Brotherhood landing site and to send orders as soon as possible, the code is five-seven-three-eight."

            The marine pulled the heavy long-range radio from his back and fiddled with it for a moment, the device hissed and buzzed for a few seconds before resolving into a voice.

            "Say again soldier."

            "This is the one hundred and seventy-fifth infantry division, we are deep in enemy territory and no longer have the manpower or the support to reach the objective, requesting orders."

            Stevenson winced as more static hissed from the receiver for a few moments before the voice returned.

            "Roger one-two-five we're going to have you link up with another unit at sector five-three… oh hell the old hotel on Northeast Avenue, I'll make sure that they will be expecting you and you'll receive further orders from them. Be advised do not repeat do not use field codes Charlie one-one-seven or Beta five-three-two, Intel says the Brotherhood has cracked them and they are no longer safe to use."

            "Roger Command, one-five-seven out."

            The lieutenant pulled a map from one of his uniform's numerous pockets and glanced at the street sign before studying it.

            "Alright, if we're here and the place we need to get to is here than I think it'll be about a five hour walk if we don't get in trouble which isn't all that likely. Assuming we run into some Brothe's here and there we should get there in about six or seven hours, probably around midnight so we should…"

            There was the sound of a distant gunshot and a cloud of blood fanned out from the back of a Cornerian marine's head.

            "Sniper, get down!"

            Fifteen safety's clicked off as the marines ran for cover and a knot of Brotherhood soldiers appeared on a nearby rooftop.

            Stevenson fired a burst of gunfire into a Brotherhood soldier's face and dove as a burst of blaster fire cut through the marine that had been running next to him, firing another burst at the Brotherhood soldier standing on a rooftop that had fired the shots. A familiar high pitched whining filled the air and even before lieutenant could give the order to take cover the group of marines scattered and sprinted for anything big enough to hide behind as a pair of Wraiths came in steep and fast and sent long lines of laser blasts raking up the street and vaporized the few marines unfortunate to be caught in the open. The pair of sleek starfighters screamed by overhead and off into the sky.

            "Move it marines go, go, go!"

            As the group of marines emerged from hiding and began to regroup a hail of bullets and blaster bolts tore through the air around them as a group of Brotherhood soldiers and an APC rounded the corner. Stevenson cursed and ducked back into his hiding place as more marines were cut down. The lieutenant peeked out from behind his own cover and called out.

            "McGregor I want you to draw fire until that bastard on the chain gun has to reload, Stevenson I want you to go out there and put a grenade in his face when he does, the rest of us will give covering fire!"

            Stevenson pulled the bayonet from the muzzle of his assault rifle and clicked the safety off of the grenade launcher bolted underneath the barrel of the weapon as the marine near him began leaning out and taking shots at the APC's gunner who responded by sending a hail of high-caliber in the marine's general direction. Stevenson waited until the chain gun finally clicked empty as the gunner exhausted the ammo supply in the weapon's hopper and the soldier began sliding a new belt into the hopper. Stevenson leapt from his hiding place as the rest of the unit opened fire and forced the Brotherhood soldiers to get their heads down, he swung his weapon toward the APC and fired. The grenade flew out and slammed into the front of the vehicle and blew a small crater in the front of the vehicle.

            "Shit!"

            The gunner continued to hurriedly feed the belt into the chain gun's hopper as Stevenson pulled another grenade from a small ammo bag that hung on the belt of his uniform and turned the small knob on the grenade launcher. He slammed the grenade into the launcher and turned the knob again. Just as the gunner finished loading the belt and his hand moved to the charging lever Stevenson sent the grenade flying straight toward his face. The hapless soldier mouthed 'shit' before the explosive slammed into him and detonated, tearing his body and the chain gun into thousands of pieces. The rest of the marines emerged from their hiding places and continued to pummel the Brotherhood troops with concentrated fire as Stevenson sprinted for the Brotherhood vehicle. He lunged and grabbed onto the handholds on the roof the APC and hauled himself up, pulling a frag grenade from his belt as he did so. Stevenson primed the grenade and tossed it down the hatch, the bastards could have a taste of the medicine they'd been dishing out so readily.

            "Fire in the hole!"

            Stevenson dove to the street and went into a roll as he hit the pavement, behind him the grenade went off with a muffled thud. A Brotherhood soldier leaned out from behind cover and trained the muzzle of his weapon on Stevenson as the Cornerian frantically reached back to unsling his own assault weapon. The soldier's finger tightened on the trigger and his face suddenly erupted into agony as a shot from a Cornerian marine hit him in the back. Stevenson climbed to his feet and freed his assault rifle and tried to wipe the soldier's blood from his face as the remaining Brotherhood soldiers scattered.

            "Come on keep moving, keep moving, don't stop unless we get into another firefight!"

            Stevenson reached into a pocket on his left leg a pulled out a small tube of stim pills. He unscrewed the one end of the tube and popped few of the small, round pills. He screwed the cap back onto the tube and slid it back into his pocket as the unit started moving again, they had a long way to go.

            Fox pulled an energy-based assault rifle from a rack of identical weapons and set it on top of the small backpack he had gotten from the supply depot. Krystal hefted a submachine gun and sighed.

            "I found a small book of Cerinian philosophy in the ruins of one of the backwater planets that had once been a sanctuary for my people. One of the quotes I found in it was from a great philosopher that died long before I was born, it said that we know more about war than peace, more about killing than living. At time like this I feel like that philosopher was right."

            Fox pulled a double handful of blaster power packs from a box and paused.

            "He probably was Krys, almost as long as I've been alive there's been conflict after conflict, I've lost friends over the years and people I know have lost friends. My parents were both claimed by violence and even when I killed Andross and then killed him again when he was reborn it didn't lessen the pain or bring them back, it just kept him from causing anymore pain like what he did to me. Politicians and generals fight wars for many reasons, but people like us fight them so that others will not have to experience the kind of pain we did."

            "I know Fox but sometimes it's not that simple. There was an incident on a planet torn apart by civil war when I was no older than nine. I was on one of the streets in the planet's main city when a gunman steps out of the back alleys and starts firing his weapon at a pair of militiamen in the crowd, but he wasn't the best shot. A boy no older than sixteen or so jumps in front of me and takes the burst that would've hit me, as he was dying I asked him why he did it and he said it was because I was so young. The shooter's weapon ran dry and I lost control, I'm not sure what I did but the next moment he was on the ground and his body was broken and bleeding. As I got a good look at him I saw that he was just a boy, no older than the one who'd saved me, and as he lay there dying I could see the fear in his eyes, the pain, the sense of betrayal. He must've mistaken me for someone else because he told me to tell his mother he loved her. I ran away and never looked back as he lay there alone on a now empty street on some backwater planet dying with no one to morn his loss but his anonymous mother and no one be there as he slipped from this world. That was the first time I'd ever killed, and I've seen his face over and over in my dreams and nightmares, the look in his eyes the last time I saw him has never left me. Of all the Brotherhood soldiers that we fought and killed on Dinosaur Planet some of them were just boys, serving their government just as we serve ours, how do you cope with all this endless killing."

            "I've had times when I've had to kill someone no older than me or sometimes even younger or had to stand by powerless as someone I knew died when there was nothing I could do about it. I've looked into their eyes as they died and I've seen the same fear and pain that that boy probably felt. But he didn't hate you for it, in a way you released him, released him from all the pain and suffering, from the seemingly endless death. The dead are lucky ones in that way, the ones who don't have to go any farther, the ones who don't have to keep fighting. All those soldiers that we've fought and killed together were our brothers and sisters in life and will someday be our brothers and sisters in death, but there is no choice. As long as there is intelligent life there will be war, and as long as there will be war there will be death, it's a cycle that we can't do anymore to stop than we can to keep the sun from rising and setting. I know that sometimes it seems like the killing will never stop but listen to me Krys, there's always an end, it's never infinite. Eventually everyone finds ways to cope with the killing until it ends.

            Fox put his hand under Krystal's chin and raised it until she was staring into his eyes.

"I know you will found your way to cope Krys."


	20. The Belly of the Beast

At the very front of the Cornerian lines an atmospheric gunship touched down just long enough to unload the soldiers it had been carrying along with Bill and Katt. Fox leapt down from his perch by the open deployment door and absorbed the impact of the landing in his knees. Behind him the last few commandos hit the ground and the gunship flew off over the city, drawing a half-hearted burst of fire from the Brotherhood lines across the ruined city square. Fox raised a pair of binoculars and peered out at the desolate no man's land that separated the two forces, instinctively ducking as a Brotherhood artillery shell exploded nearby. The former city square was now empty and filled with rubble and debris of all shapes and sizes, with the occasional cluster of razor wire or a ruined hover car, and while he couldn't see them there were without a doubt Brotherhood soldiers entrenched in the ruined buildings on the far side.

"Brotherhood snipers are going to have the area pretty well staked out, and even if we were to get past them we don't know how many soldiers they have over there, any ideas?"

Krystal produced a map from a pocket in the camo's she was wearing.

"According to these there should be a series of underground tunnels underneath here that the Brotherhood might not know about."

"The sewers?"

"Yeah."

"That'll do."

Krystal pointed to a manhole cover not far from where they were standing.

"That's the one we want."

"All right marines we're moving out."

One of the commandos pried the cover from its resting place and dropped into the dark tunnel below followed one by one by his comrades. Fox stifled his nose against the smell and slid down the ladder, dropping into the darkness.

The vulpine mercenary landed knee deep in very dirty looking water. Fox moved and moments later Krystal landed in the spot he had just vacated. As the blue-furred vixen moved aside to allow the next volunteer to come down Fox's eyes began to adjust to the dim lighting as he surveyed his new surroundings. The tunnel was lit by dim service lights hanging on the walls that looked as if the would be hard pressed to illuminate an area half the size of this one and some of the commandos had turned on the flashlights that had been built into the muzzles of their assault weapons. The walls were crusted with grime and some kind of heavy green fungus and were marred by the occasional graffiti, though the reason why anyone would've ever have been down here to write it was beyond him. The last of the commando dropped down into the tunnel and someone up on the street returned the manhole cover to its place. Krystal consulted the map and pointed in the direction they needed to go. With Fox and Krystal in the lead the small group of Cornerian volunteers began to wade through the sewage-filled water in the direction that should take them underneath the Brotherhood lines. As they passed a point where their tunnel intersected another one Fox caught a glimpse of a group of some kind of rat-like creature scurrying for shelter as the bright beams of light swept the tunnel and wondered just how often this place had been maintained before the war. As they rounded a corner Fox heard a mechanical whirring and the commando behind called out a warning.

"Don't move, be very still!"

Fox caught sight of the offending object; it was some kind of cylindrical pod on a small tripod and was studded with small lenses and what appeared to be sensors. The pod swiveled towards him and Fox froze and tried to hold, as still as possible as the lens lit up. The pod continued to rotate and search for the source of the motion for at least twenty seconds before closing down again. As the probe went dormant the commando behind Fox removed some kind of ball shaped device from a pocket on his uniform and flung it at the probe, it clung to the sensor pod and an electrical current surged over the probe, Fox let out his breath.

"If anyone was watching it'll look like it malfunctioned."

"What was that thing, some kind of sentry drone?"

"Looks like it, the Brothe's must've left it here."

"Seems like a pretty ineffective way to protect this tunnel."

"Maybe they don't know it leads all the way to our territory, or maybe it's all they can spare."

Bill looked at the dormant device and then at the roof of the tunnel.

"If the Brotherhood put this thing here than we must be close to their territory."

Fox struggled to keep his balance as a thundering rattling sound filled the tunnel, shaking the maintenance lights and creating miniature waves in the dirty water, as the ceiling seemed to shake to the point where it would collapse. Just as Fox thought his teeth would be shaken from his skull the sound and shaking began to recede and a commando spoke up.

"Damn, that sounded like a whole frickin battalion rolling over our heads."

"It probably was."

Fox pulled a small fiber optic probe no thicker than a twig from his equipment belt and waded over to a small storm drain. He connected the long, snake-like probe to a small handheld display screen and cautiously fed it through the grating and turned the probe in several directions while watching what the probe saw on the screen. He could see a war torn street with Brotherhood troops swarming about it. A platoon of Brotherhood soldiers ran down the sidewalk at a brisk pace, a pair of medics sat eating MRE's on the curb, and rapidly fading into the distance Fox could see the backside of one of the lumbering APCs that had shaken the tunnel so badly just moments before. He withdrew the probe, and replaced it and the display screen on his belt.

"We're here alright but we might wanna find a better place to get topside."

Wolf O'Donnell removed the equipment belt from the dead Brotherhood soldier and fastened it around the waste of his newly procured uniform. He tossed the soldier's body into a nearby dumpster and walked out of the alley, reflecting on the soldier's stupidity. The bastard had been confident enough in the area's security to go into a back alley to urinate, and had paid the price. Wolf walked past a pair of medics sitting on the curb and waited for a group of APCs to pass by before crossing the street. If he was lucky no one would pay him much attention and he could find a way to get across the lines to the Cornerian controlled section of the city and maybe kill a few more Brothe's while he was at it. As he passed a squat fenced in bunker that had once been a shelter for civilians a series of screams and shouts drew his attention. A group of at least thirty black-clad Brotherhood soldiers were wrestling a larger group of hapless Cornerian citizens into a pair of waiting APCs. He would've liked to help them but had no wish to get himself killed doing something stupid and merely noted the strange winged dagger insignia that was emblazoned on the right arm sleeve of each soldiers uniform. Wolf pulled the canteen from his belt as he walked down another back alley and took a few gulps of cold water, maybe he could find some kind of map or schematic of the area that would help him find a way across the no man's land. As he passed a manhole cover it suddenly popped open and a pair of hands grabbed his boots, yanking his feet out from under him. Wolf tried to kick his feet free as a green clad figure burst out of the manhole cover, tackling him and trying to draw a combat knife across his throat. Wolf wrenched the blade away from his throat and grabbed soldier's arm while hooking his foot around the soldier's leg then spun and threw him to the ground. As the soldier tried to get up Wolf recognized the uniform as some kind Cornerian special forces… wait Cornerian then why were they…

"Ahh shit, the uniform."

A second figure leapt up from the manhole cover with a weapon in hand just as Wolf drew the sidearm from his stolen equipment belt. Wolf brought his gun arm up and toward his new attacker just as the soldier brought his own weapon to bear and they both found themselves staring down the barrel of their opponent's weapon. The two combatants stood there with their weapons trained on each other's faces, neither one firing, neither one moving. Wolf stared into his opponents face, but wait it couldn't be.

The first commando leapt out onto the street after catching the lone Brotherhood soldier off guard. Fox leapt up a moment latter with a pistol drawn to find the commando on the ground. The vulpine mercenary brought the muzzle of his silenced pistol up and trained it at point blank on the Brotherhood soldier's face. Fox finally got a good look at his opponents face and his eyes went wide, his opponent obviously shared his disbelief.

"Wolf? What the hell are you doing here?"

"I should be asking you the same question."

Slowly, warily the two mercenaries lowered their weapons but didn't take their gaze off each other. As the rest of the team climbed out of the small hole in the ground and the manhole cover was put back in place Fox spoke again.

"If you make any noise or do anything stupid than we're all going to get killed and unless you've suddenly joined the Brotherhood, which I doubt than you'll be just as dead, any questions?"

"Yeah, what took you guys so long, I mean we're on the same side right?"

"I think so."

Everyone winced and instinctively ducked as a pair of Banshees flew by overhead.

"Come on, we should get moving."


	21. Tightening the Noose

General Pepper cupped his hand to his face as he lit the fresh batch of assorted powders in his pipe and tried to let the smoke calm his chaotic mind. The front lines had taken casualties from the Brotherhood artillery barrage but nothing serious, the real problem was the effect Pepper was sure the situation would have on his troops. Being stuck in some bunker or ruined building listening to the sounds of artillery shells exploding all around them for days on end, praying that one didn't come down right on your head and all the while waiting for the enemy to make their inevitable final thrust and overrun their positions wasn't a very healthy thing for the mind or the body. With the Cornerian fleet in shambles and a sizable portion of the city under Brotherhood control morale was alarmingly low, and even the best propaganda broadcasts could do little to help, worse there were rumors of civilians being rounded up by the hundreds and taken to brutal forced labor camps deep within Brotherhood controlled space. Pepper returned his gaze to the holomap of Cornerian City and the swarms of colored shapes that moved within the miniature, semitransparent city. According to the few Cornerian spy satellites that the Brotherhood had not found and shot down another battalion of Brotherhood infantry had joined the gathering forces at the edge of enemy controlled territory on the far side of the no man's land, with the rest of the area already swarming with more hostiles. Pepper sat back in his chair, even though the odds had become extremely lopsided he still had another card to play. If the commando team that had been dispatched two days ago could somehow complete their mission and knock out the camp were the Brotherhood artillery was stationed, or better yet destroy the communication relays than they would disrupt the Brotherhood's organization and give his forces a chance to do some damage, maybe even score the victory his forces needed to increase morale. All things considered he would give the team a one in twelve chance of success, but the thought was comforting just the same. If the team failed well then Pepper would make sure that those Brotherhood bastards paid a few hundred lives for every block they took. The contents of his pipe ran dry and Pepper retrieved a small bottle of the stuff from his pocket and began to refill his pipe, there had been countless wars in this system and if the latter case came true then it a twisted way it would be fitting that this system would end in violence.

The alleyway was the identical to countless others that connected the numerous streets of Cornerian City. It was littered with rubble that had fallen from the buildings that surrounded it and the collection of empty bullet casings that lay strewn about one of the entrances bore testament to a firefight at some time or other over the past month. The relative silence was broken by the sound of rubble crunching underfoot. Fox McCloud propelled himself from around the corner and performed a three hundred sixty degree Special Forces turn as he quietly ran behind a rusted dumpster. The vulpine mercenary peeked out from his hiding place and when no enemy fire came held up his hand gave the all clear signal. The small group of Cornerian commandos along with Bill, Katt, Falco and the somewhat incorporative Wolf O'Donnell sprinted half crouching into the alley and moved on to the entrance at the far end, checking carefully before sprinting across the empty street into the next alley. Fox checked his PDA as the group slipped into an abandoned building for a nav check, Krystal sat down beside him.

"Only four more blocks to go."

"What do we do if the other team isn't there when we get there?"

"One step at a time, I'm just hoping that they don't manage to bring half the Brotherhood army down on us when they arrive."

"Hopefully, but if they do than we can come one step closer to avenging the deaths of so many innocent people."

"I want that as badly as you do Krys, but we have to stay focused on the mission."

"I know, it's just that whatever happened at Cerenia I was too young to anything to stop or even remember, here I can do something to make a difference."

"Don't worry Krys, when we raid that Brotherhood base, we'll get our chance to make a difference and until then you have to remember that nothing in the Cornerian military ever goes as planned."

Wolf O'Donnell sat in the corner, silently watching the exchange. A flurry of weapons fire sounded in the distance and he instinctively ducked and muttered a curse as he banged his head on light that was hanging from the ceiling. The walls began to vibrate as a loud rattling sound came from somewhere outside, it sounded like heavy treads of some kind, most likely Brotherhood armor. The commando watching the street ducked away from the window.

"Everybody get down, Brothies coming up the street!"

Wolf dropped to the floor and crawled towards a small crack in the wall, his hand going for the blaster on his belt as the rest of the rooms occupants hid and readied their weapons. The rattling increased and through the crack he could see a dozen Brotherhood soldiers clustered around an APC, Wolf gritted his teeth as the APC's powerful treads rolled by about twenty feet from his face. He didn't dare move a muscle for fear of being seen though most of the soldiers seemed bored and less than alert. The patrol finally turned the corner and continued on to the next street and Wolf let out the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. The rest of the group cautiously emerged from their hiding places and Wolf slid his blaster pistol back into its holster.

"They're gone."

Fox ignored him and took a quick look down the street that the Brotherhood squad had taken.

"We didn't expect to encounter very many Brotherhood forces in this sector, this might complicate things."

Another burst of weapons fire, this one much closer and longer than the last sounded somewhere off to the northeast.

"What are they shooting at?"

"Hell if I know, could be Cornerian soldiers that have been cut off back here, could be civilian resistance fighters, could be the marines we're trying to link up with."

The group moved back outside into the alley and crouched in the shadows. They sprinted across the street one by one, just as they had on the last street, and the one before that and the one before that and who knows how many more. Wolf's turn came and he sprinted across the street and into the shadows to wait for the last few commandos and then repeat the process until they reached the rendezvous point.

General Osborn walked along the perimeter of the camp admiring the state of destruction and chaos that the city stretched before him was in. There was a particularly large amount of smoke rising from the Cornerian controlled section of the city today, a sign that the soldiers manning the artillery were doing their job well. Another full battalion of troops had been sent in along with a few a small division of tanks to prepare for the next probing attack on the Cornerian lines and soon enough the final push that would crush their defenses and come swarming into their section and storm their bases, ripping off the head of the Cornerian beast so that the body may die. Osoborn turned and walked back into the camp, past the row of mortar tanks and the group of engineers who were working to piece together four fixed artillery batteries that had arrived disassembled this morning. According to the recent reports a platoon of elite shock troops, another platoon of regular infantry, and a small division of armor would arrive tomorrow to further prepare the Brotherhood forces for the attack. Osborn walked past a group of soldiers who were trying to wrestle camo netting over two of the mortar tanks, not that they needed it but it was always good to not underestimate one's adversary. One of his aids hurried up to him with another report, Osborn accepted it as he entered the command tent.

"The attack had been moved up?"

"Yes sir, orders came in from the High Chancellor himself, he wants this planet subdued within four weeks."

"Get me Grand Admiral Stanford."

"Yes sir, he'd expecting you sir."

One of the technicians pushed a series of buttons and a few moments latter the image of the Grand Admiral appeared on one of the holoscreens. Osborn didn't hesitate despite the Stanford's higher rank.

"What's all this about Admiral?"

If the Stanford was offended by Osborn's bluntness or being called admiral instead of Grand Admiral he didn't show it.

"Aww General, how goes the campaign down there, well I presume."

"A message came in this morning saying that three weeks have been shaved off my time table for subduing the Cornerian ground forces, I presume you know why."

An alarm of some kind sounded from outside of the camera's reception radius and Stanford turned and bellowed an order before turning back to the camera.

"Of course I do General, but first do you consider all personnel in the room with you to be trustworthy."

Osborn's skin slowly began to take on a lighter green color, a sign that he was interested.

"Yes, I would say they all check out."

"Good, High Chancellor Grandeur has decreed that this planet must fall in four weeks so that additional forces can be sent to Venom."

Osborn realized what this had to mean.

"Are our forces meeting heavy resistance in that system?"

Stanford leaned a little closer to the camera.

"They're meeting a lot more resistance than we thought they would; I've heard rumors that they've even pushed our forces back in several areas and our forces were unprepared for a series of harsh windstorms caused by the large volcanic ash content of the atmosphere."

"Has Grandeur suspended his original plan in favor of an immediate frontal assault?"

"No he said to continue the bombardment as planned but move the main attack forward ten days, I am also told that soon more effective artillery rounds will be coming in which should achieve results more quickly and compensate for the bombardment being shortened."

"Very well, Corneria will fall in four weeks."


	22. Day of Defeat

High Chancellor Grandeur was standing in front of the large 'viewport' of his recently refurbished office on board the Righteous Fist when his aid, a grey furred lynx arrived at the entrance to his chambers and requested permission to enter over the short range intercom that linked the entrance and his office, Grandeur keyed the intercom and told the guards to admit him. He turned from the view of Dinosaur Planet which wasn't a true viewport at all but a large viewscreen linked to cameras on the outer hull. The door hissed open and the aid briskly stepped through, pausing to allow the door to whisk closed again before advancing to the base of the large pulpit that raised Grandeur's desk and the viewscreen a good one and a half meters from the floor, forcing visitors to look up at the High Chancellor.

"Sit my loyal servant, what is it?"

The aid sat down in one of the small chairs that sat at the edge of the pulpit.

"My lord I have brought a report from Admiral Lovell concerning the progress of his campaign at Venom, a report from the engineer teams on Dinosaur Planet concerning the progress of the terraforming and construction, and a report from the research frigate Orpheon concerning the progress of the tiberion research."

"Very well you may continue."

The aid nodded and inserted a data card into the slot on arm of his chair; a holoscreen came to life on Grandeur's desk displaying the various pages of the three reports.

"Admiral Lovell reports that the assault on Venom has met a minor setback. Because of a series of severe windstorms on the surface he says that many of our tanks have been rendered less effective because of severe and extended sandblasting to their view exposed components, it would also seem that the toxic gases of the atmosphere have acidic properties when mixed with extensive amounts of volcanic sand and ash and blown through the air at high speeds. He also stated that he was not adequately informed of the strength of these storms or the strength of the Venomian army. He requests that

Grandeur raised a finger, the signal for silence and the aid halted in mid sentence.

"But he was warned?"

"Yes my lord."

Grandeur brought one hand to his chin and stroked it thoughtfully.

"Continue, on to the progress of the tiberion research."

"Yes my lord, our scientists report that they believe they have perfected a tiberion-based nerve gas that can be delivered by shell, bomb, grenade, or handheld gas sprayers. They also report that experiments with tiberion as a mutagen are relatively promising, experiments with captured enemy combatants has resulted in a seventy-seven percent fatality rate however the subjects show a drastic increase in physical attributes such as strength and speed but unfortunately the tiberion degenerates mental capacity and causes frequent insanity and aggressiveness, never the less they feel that with further experimentation they will be able to find a way to prevent the degeneration of mental facilities. They report that experiments with native life have resulted in only a sixty-one percent fatality rate possibly due to the natural endurance and resilience of many of this planet's native species. They report that these subjects also suffer from frequent cases of insanity and increased aggression that makes them impossible to control but again feel that they will eventually be able to find a way to counter these effects and the process will be perfected within the allotted timetable."

"Very well, you may tell them to keep up the good work, you are dismissed."

"Yes my lord."

The aid rose from his seat and gave a quick ceremonial bow before briskly marching back to the door and exiting the chamber. Grandeur sat down at his desk and took a small disk-shaped piece of candy from the small bowl sitting at the edge of his desk, one of the view pleasures he alloyed himself while working and savored the taste as he began to read the reports.

Colonel Bromley entered his quarters and noticed the flashing red light on the small desk situated in the corner of the room signaling his latest orders had come in. He pressed the button and the holoscreen whirred to life displaying a multi-paged document. The lupine colonel hurriedly skimmed it. He was being sent to the front lines at Corneria, and was to report to the carrier "Peace and Unity" in three days at oh-eight-hundred hours. He typed in a command and then an access code to bring up the roster and searched for a single name, damn Sydney's name wasn't on it. He'd have to talk to her about this and maybe see if there was a way he could personally request her transfer before he left. Oh well either way he was heading back to the battle.

The Cornerian Defense Base was bustling with activity, dozens of Cornerian soldiers and marines were scurrying about checking weapons, stowing equipment in vehicles, and performing the many tasks required to prepare for an immanent attack on enemy territory. Engineers and mechanics hurried among rows of Broadsword starfighters and Sentinel class atmospheric gunships performing maintenance checks, connecting fuel lines and wheeling in racks of air-to-air missiles and novastar bombs, while others were performing similar tasks on APCs, tanks, and LRVs. The whole chaotic scene was watched over by powerful flood lights and groups of shouting officers.

General Pepper stood in front of the window of the command bases observation area staring down at the sizable force that was preparing below him. Two hours ago he had given the order to prepare for a nearly all out attack on the Brotherhood lines and the force that was readying itself in front of him would leave the base in exactly twenty four hours, six hours after that they would swarm across the no-man's-land and hit the Brotherhood with everything they had. There was a chance they would win, but it would be a costly victory. If McCloud's team came through and attacked the Brotherhood camp in time than they might be able to disrupt the Brotherhood chain of command long enough to allow the Cornerian forces to push the Brotherhood back. Even better, with what was left of the Cornerian fleet clustered directly over the sector that was still held the Brotherhood would have no idea that their enemy was about to attack. Pepper didn't know how many young men he would be sending off to die but he should've been the first one to fall for allowing the Brotherhood to get a foothold on Corneria. The lists of those who had already fallen in battle at Dinosaur Planet or during the enemy invasion here on Corneria were vast and get longer every day. In thirty hours the mindless bloodshed would begin anew and those dark and forbidding lists of casualties would get even longer. The stage was set, and in thirty hours it would be zero hour and yet another red dawn.

Sergeant Stevenson heard the whistling of an incoming shell before he heard one of the marines shout a warning. The artillery shell slammed into a nearby building and the force of the explosion tore apart three of the seven floors sending rubble raining down on a nearby street. The entire building shook and emitted a deep groaning as the top two floors came crashing down.

"Holy shit that thing's coming down!"

The building's durasteel skeleton gave way and the massive structure began to fall, Stevenson dove behind a pile of rubble and covered his ears. The ground around him shook with such force that loose rubble fell from surrounding buildings and the few windows that were still intact shattered. Covering his ears did little to protect Stevenson from the roar of the building hitting the ground. The rubble began to settle and Stevenson staggered clumsily to his feet. The world was spinning around him and he tried to force it back into focus, his reward was a splitting pain at the base of his brain. Just as the spinning began to stop a pair of marines vanished in a green explosion. Stevenson spun and through the thick dust that had been thrown into the air saw the dark silhouette of a Brotherhood soldier shrouded in a green glow as his plasma projectile launcher recharged for another shot. In one fluid motion Stevenson brought his assault rifle up, clicked the safety off, and put a three shot burst into the figure. The Cornerian sergeant sprinted for better cover as enemy muzzle flashes exploded all around him, firing as he went. Stevenson reached the entrance to an abandoned building and put another burst into the dark shape of another Brotherhood soldier. Marines fell left and right, firing at the silhouettes of Brotherhood soldiers hidden in the dust. A burst of blaster bolts tore through a Cornerian marine as he tried to make a dash for better shelter and Stevenson put a burst of suppressing fire in the Brotherhood soldier's direction. The lieutenant stood up and bellowed an order.

"Get in the buildings you bastards!"

The marines scattered as more of their comrades were cut down by enemy fire and Stevenson ducked as burst of Brotherhood blaster bolts scorched the wall not six inches from his head. Four marines made it two the shelter of an abandoned store front and set up a base of fire, dropping several Brotherhood soldiers before a rocket arced out of the smoke and brought down the entire front of the store. The lieutenant sprinted for the building Stevenson had taken shelter in, he had just reached the doorway and turned to return fire when four bullets tore through the front of his armored vest and exploded out of his back. He staggered backwards Stevenson found himself starring into the lieutenant's face, now a mask of pain and agony. Two more bullets tore through him and all life fled from the soldier's face, his limp body falling to the blood drenched ground.

Stevenson turned and redoubled his efforts at providing covering fire for the last few marines still alive, sending a hail of bullets in the general direction of enemy fire as the amounts of bullets and blaster bolts tearing into the wall around the window began to increase. His weapon clicked empty once again and the Cornerian sergeant ducked back into cover, hand reaching into his ammunition pouchâ€ his fingers found nothing.

"Ahh shit."

The chaotic chatter coming in over his headset chose that moment to resolve into a clear voice.

"Base of fire shift right, we need some support over here god damn it!"

Stevenson keyed his own headset as he continued to frantically glance around the room for some kind of weapon.

"My weapons out of ammo, I'll see what I can do."

Stevenson drew his sidearm, a lightweight blaster pistol and emptied the power pack in the direction of a group of Brotherhood soldiers who running across the street into a perfect flanking position. Stevenson ducked back into cover, tossing aside the empty pistol and his eyes fell on the dead lieutenant.

"Sorry sir, I need this more than you do."

Stevenson reached out and hurriedly undid the soldier's equipment belt, pulling it back into the safety of his shelter. Stevenson opened the ammo bag and transferred the few clips the officer had left into his own ammo bag and grabbed the last few grenades as well. With experienced hands he slammed a fresh clip into his assault rifle and jammed the charging lever back and then forward again before leaning out in front of the window again and opening fire on a second group of Brotherhood soldiers that had taken up a flanking position. Two of the four remaining Cornerian marines had hidden behind a pile of rubble while the other pair had taken shelter behind the wreck of Cornerian LRV, all four were busy sending suppressing fire at a squad of Brotherhood soldiers who were hiding behind a pile of sandbags that had been set up some time in the few weeks. A flurry of enemy bullets tore through one of the Cornerian marines hiding behind the rubble and a high-velocity grenade arced into the hiding spot and tore the second marine to pieces.

Stevenson put a burst of fire into a Brotherhood soldier's head as an enemy support gunner stood up, his chain gun sending a hail of bullets hammering against Stevenson's hiding place. Stevenson cried out in pain as a bullet skimmed his left arm, taking a small piece out of his bicep. He ducked back into cover, clutching a hand over the wound; it was just a flesh wound. Taking his assault rifle in one hand with the other clamped over the wound he leaned out of his shelter again just in time to see a flurry of blaster bolts tear through the third marine's face. Stevenson sent burst after burst of suppressing fire at the largest group of Brotherhood soldiers, the still smoking pile of empty bullet casings at his feet growing rapidly. The last marine was cut down in a hail of Brotherhood fire and Stevenson emptied his last clip in the direction of his comrade's killers as a Brotherhood rocket soldier leaned out of his shelter and aimed his weapon at Stevenson's position. Stevenson threw himself away from the wall and for a brief moment the world in front of him exploded into blinding light and flames. He hit the ground as the room came down around him, summoning what strength was left in him to role between a pair of support girders that had only moments before been part of the building's support skeleton. He banged his head hard on a piece of debris and the last thing he saw before his vision burst into blackness was the ceiling coming down towards him.


	23. Gathering Darkness

Fox raised a pair of binoculars to his face, across a large open area he could see the building they were supposed to rendezvous with the Cornerian marines at, he reached back and gave the 'all clear' signal. The rest of the team materialized from their hiding places and crept up alongside him. Bill shouldered the sniper rifle he'd taken at the start of the mission and scanned the area.

"There's no movement in or around the building."

Fox lowered his binoculars.

"Maybe they've run into some trouble."

"Could be, we'll find out soon enough."

The commandos sprinted across the open area and into the building, taking up defensive positions inside. Bill swept a pile dusty plastic cups and dishes off a table and spread out a schematic of the city on its cracked and corroding surface.

"Were about right here."

The canine pilot drew a small red circle on the map.

"If all the intel is accurate then the target should be somewhere in this area, just outside the city."

Bill drew in another red circle.

"I'd say that we've got another few blocks to go before reach the edge of the city and from there no more than half a mile."

Fox scratched his chin.

"They'll probably have snipers and patrols all over the area, the patrols we can avoid but does anyone have a plan for dealing with the snipers?"

"I'm thinking there may be a way to hitch a ride underneath a Brotherhood vehicle, maybe a supply truck or APC, once we get out of the city we'll go from there."

A Cornerian commando walked over to the table carrying a datapad.

"Sir, you may want to see this."

Fox accepted the device, on its small screen it showed a diagram of the city, and at a point less than a block away had a flashing red symbol. Krystal walked over from the table.

"What is it?"

"A distress signal."

Fox spoke up.

"How long has this been going?"

"We don't know captain, our comm. specialist just picked it up, since this is all we got then the soldier or soldiers sending this are either too busy to talk or unable to, neither of which is a good thing."

"Do you know for sure if these are the marines were waiting for."

"I'm told that it's within a ninety percent chance of being them."

Wolf put everyone's thoughts into actions as he produced an energy-based submachine gun that he'd liberated from a Brotherhood soldier and jammed a fresh clip into it. Fox picked his own weapon up and checked its charge.

"First squad you'll stay here and keep this area secure, Falco, Bill, Wolf, and Krys, you're with me. Will call in when we reach the beacon's position and then see if we have any survivors that can still fight. Chances are if anyone's still alive they'll be wounded so I want anyone who has medical training ready by the time we get back, whenever that may be."

Falco brandished a pair of blaster pistols.

"Let's go kill some Brothe's."

The whine of incoming dropships filled the Brotherhood base camp. General Osborn stood just outside the cleared area that served as a landing field as four of the compact aircraft touched down. The armored troop doors slid open with a hiss and lowered into ramps, crushing the soft grass as they settled into place. Fresh troops marched out of the dropships, half of them regular foot soldiers, the other half clad in heavy body armor and unusually thick metal helmets. The faces of these soldiers were hidden by a high-tech face mask with three burning red electronic lens giving them the appearance of some kind of metal insect. The soldiers reached the bottom of the troop ramp and came to a halt, upon closer inspection it was easy to see that they were all noticeably beefier than their comrades and moved with agility and ease despite the considerable weight of their gear, they were the EMST, Elite Mechanized Shock Troopers and some of the finest infantrymen the Brotherhood had to offer. Osborn walked out onto the field and the soldiers standing at the ends of the troop ramps, both EMST and regular soldiers alike snapped into a crisp salute. Osborn returned their salutes and gestured for them to be at ease.

"Welcome to the front gentlemen."

Krystal cautiously peered around out from behind a pile of rubble, half of the buildings in the street beyond had collapsed and the street was clogged with rubble which was in turn littered with bodies, some wearing Cornerian green while others wore Brotherhood grey. A dozen living soldiers were wading through the rubble and corpses, checking for life signs from gray clad corpses and prodding the fallen Cornerians with bayonet's to make sure they were dead. The blue furred vixen raised a comlink to her face.

"Fox, I've got a squad of Brotherhood soldiers over there."

"Roger Krys, I see them, what about you Falco."

"I see 'em buddy, can we put 'em down."

"Not yet, Bill, Wolf you got a visual."

"Affirmative."

"Get ready to take them out."

Movement in the corner of her eye caught Krystal's attention, she turned her head to see a red dot climbing up her arm towards her head. The distant sniper realized his target was aware of the danger and pulled the trigger just as the vixen threw herself in the opposite direction. Two 30mm bullets tore through the space the vixen had just vacated and buried themselves in the concrete wall behind her hiding place. The Brotherhood soldiers spun in the direction of the noise and readied their weapons, a dozen safeties clicked off as they moved to take cover or flank the pile the noise had come from. Fox's voice came over the comlink.

"Ahh shit, shoot em, shoot em!"

Four streams of blaster bolts and bullets came raining down on the Brotherhood soldiers tearing through the grey clad figures and sending streams of blood spattering over nearby debris. The remaining soldiers dove for cover and returned fire in the directions that the enemy fire was coming form. A curse came over the comm. as a grenade flew in the direction of Falco's hiding place and the blue and red feathered avian dove to the ground as the small explosive went off behind him. A moment later he reappeared with his feathers badly scorched but otherwise not seriously injured, he gave a war cry and opened fire with both pistols.

Krystal pulled a frag grenade from her belt, armed it, and tossed it at a pair of Brotherhood soldiers hunkering behind a large concrete slab that had fallen into the street when one of the nearby buildings had collapsed. The round explosive flew over the concrete slab and landed at the soldiers' feet. One of the soldiers threw himself away from the grenade and exposed himself to a stream of blaster bolts from Bill while the second soldier desperately tried to kick the grenade out of the shelter. His boot struck the grenade and it just as it sailed away from the soldier it detonated, tearing the hapless soldier into a thousand pieces. The last remaining soldier tried to run; a blaster bolt caught him in the back as he reached the mouth of a nearby alley.

As the last soldier fell Krystal frantically scanned the nearby rooftops for the sniper. Once again she saw movement at the edge of her vision and without moving her head looked down at it. The small red dot moved from her shoulder to her head, a shot rang out and Krystal expected to be dead before she hit the ground. Wolf stood up from his hiding place, a smoking weapon in his hand, about fifty feet behind Krystal a Brotherhood soldier fell from a rooftop with a hole blown threw his chest.

"You missed one."

With that Wolf turned and shot a wounded Brotherhood soldier who had been quietly trying to pull his sidearm from his belt.

Fox silently watched Wolf walk over to another Brotherhood soldier and check for life signs. Was this the same lupine mercenary he'd known over eight years ago? Fox heard a noise behind and spun with his weapon ready to find no one there. No less alert the vulpine mercenary walked in the direction the sound was coming from until it resolved into a muffled voice.

"Over here."

A hand burst from a pile of rubble and Fox trained his weapon on it, through the blood stains he could make out Cornerian green.

"Guys, over here!"

Fox began carefully digging through the rubble as Krystal and Wolf joined him. Together the three mercenaries lifted a heavy support beam that the rubble had covered to reveal a Cornerian marine in a bloody uniform. Fox extended a hand and the soldier accepted, hauling him to his feet. Fox glanced at the name written on the back of the helmet, Stevenson.

"Are you the one who sent the distress signal?"

The soldier managed to nod his head.

"How badly are wounded?"

The marine responded by standing on his own and pointing to a bullet wound on his left arm.

"Not badly?"

The marine nodded.

"Alright lets get him back to the old hotel."


	24. A New Hope

In the next few chapters you'll have to excuse the strange way of changing scenes but Fanfiction is being temperamental right now and will not preserve any kind of marks between paragraphs.

(Break)

Katt sat in front of a narrow gash in the wall of the ruined building, a blaster rifle lying in her lap. She couldn't help but look out at the shattered buildings and rubble strewn streets through the crack in the wall and feel the burden of failure. When ever her gaze fell on one of the dead civilians, an equine male lying in the street where he had fallen with no one to bury him, she couldn't help but feel the icy tendrils of doubt both in herself and her comrades creeping into her heart. How long had it taken for the Brotherhood to overrun the outer planets? How long had it taken them to reach the very steps of the Cornerian capital? A commando's voice brought her out of her solemn reverie.

"Someone's coming up the southeast street!"

Katt raised her blaster rifle and clicked the safety off as she slid its muzzle through the gash in the wall, training it on the Southeast Boulevard. A voice crackled over the comm.

"This is Captain Grey; we're coming up on your position hold your fire."

Katt breathed a sigh of relief as Bill, Falco, Fox, Krystal, and Wolf came into view along with a very battered Cornerian marine. The group reached the entrance to the building and several of the commandos immediately helped the marine onto a small table that had been cleared of debris in preparation for the arrival of wounded. Katt reached the building's central room just as the four mercenaries and the Cornerian pilot entered and collapsed into the handful of chairs left in the building, Katt sat down next to Falco.

"I guess there was only one still alive?"

Fox nodded.

"The marine can't say very much right now. From what we could tell he's got some minor wounds all over his body, a nasty bullet wound in one of his arms, and an even nastier piece of rusty metal that pierced his chest plate and got lodged in his midsection, all we could do is inject him with some heavy duty disinfectants and hope that he doesn't have lead poisoning or whatever the hell that piece of metal might have had on it."

Bill spoke up.

"The medics said it would take them at least half an hour to patch him up completely, but after that were going to have to move out, this has taken too long already."

"Actually while you were away our comm. Specialist managed to tap the Brotherhood communication network and has gotten us a list of arrivals and departures of supply convoys in the area that are bringing fresh supplies to the Brotherhood frontlines."

"He's sure that the Brotherhood didn't pick him up?"

Katt shook her head.

"He said the chances of enemy technicians picking him up are slim to none as long as the power levels are kept low and the comm. unit is left on passive mode."

"Good, tell everyone to be ready to leave in about an hour."

(Break)

Captain Whitcomb stood in front of the main view port on the bridge of his flagship 'Defender' staring off into the stars and wondering how many of those distant systems had ever been engulfed in as many bloody civil wars as this blasted system. Some of those stars though were eclipsed by the Brotherhood fleet hanging in the distance and he was reminded that even civil wars weren't enough anymore, now they had foreign forces invading the system, as if with the intent of nothing more than keeping the bloody legacy alive. Indeed the Brotherhood behaved enough like one would expect a massive interstellar empire to but the cause of their holocaust against the Lylatian people continued to puzzle him. It also puzzled him that while the Brotherhood had his fleet surrounded and outnumbered they did not press the attack but merely kept them trapped within a circle of very large guns and a lot of firepower.

A chill went up Whitcomb's spine as he recalled a certain battle during the war in which Andross and his Venomian minions were defeated, when a group of Katinan ships had been surrounded above the planet they were defending but the enemy did not press the attack. As it turned out the Venomians had been there to keep them from escaping while Andross had something special planned for them. That something special had been that massive disc-shaped assault ship that had fired its enormous particle cannon into the midst of the Katinan fleet and wiped most of them out, then mopped up the survivors with a second shot, and all from outside the range of the Katinan ship's weapons.

"Captain we have an incoming transmission from Cornerian Command."

"Put it on."

Strangely the holo projector remained silent and for a moment Whitcomb wondered if there was yet another Brotherhood jamming field or some kind of interference. After a few moments one of the large display screens mounted just above the main view port changed from a rotating Cornerian insignia to a long series of symbols and numbers. Whitcomb sat down in his command chair and pushed a button on the arm, causing a computer screen and keyboard to extend from the side of the chair and swivel into position in front of him. Whitcomb typed in his personal access code and the numbers '5117 alpha' resolved from the jumbled mass of text. The leopard captain typed in the necessary pass codes and the message finally resolved into words.

"Be advised massive attack by friendly ground forces in thirty hours, be prepared to make a concentrated attack on the Brotherhood fleet at zero hour. Be prepared to use whatever forces you have left and do whatever needs to be done. The Brotherhood fleet must be defeated or otherwise held off at any cost, failure is not an option."

"General Pepper

Serial Number: 527-60"

Whitcomb slumped back in his chair. Attack the much larger fleet that had him completely surrounded, that was suicide! If he could somehow break through the fleet his ships could turn around and only be fighting the enemy from one direction but still after all the time he had spent staring at the screen showing the Brotherhood ship's positions he had not been able to find any weak spots in their formation. After a moment Whitcomb roused his computer from its sleep mode and began to once again study the Brotherhood ship's positions and compare them with their position's an hour ago as he had already done countless time before. He had thirty hours to come up with a plan to somehow make this whole thing work.

(Break)

One of the Cornerian commandos helped Stevenson off the makeshift operating table were they had patched up his wounds. A second commando injected him with a small cylindrical device complete with a retractable needle, nanomeds. The microscopic machines would flow through his blood stream and promote rapid regeneration of damaged tissue. The commandos stood back and allowed him to stand on his own. As Stevenson entered the building's central room he found that the group of commandos who'd rescued him were already waiting for him, the red furred vulpine and gray and white furred husky got up to greet him.

"Sergeant... Stevenson is it? I am Captain Bill Grey of the Cornerian Fighter Pilot Corps and this is Captain Fox McCloud."

Stevenson shook both men's hands.

"It's an honor to meet Captain McCloud, it's a shame that that bastard Andross couldn't have died a thousand times for what he did."

"I made his one death as painful as I could."

Bill interrupted the conversation.

"You were the only survivor in your unit?"

"Yes sir, we were ambushed by Brotherhood forces in the area where you found me. We tried to put a fight but we had already been too badly weakened from previous battles, even if we hadn't been I don't think it would've mattered much."

"I understand, don't worry though where we're going you'll get plenty of chances to avenge them, and you don't need to call me sir."

"Where exactly are we going?"

"I'll give you a quick briefing on the way but there's no time now, we've got a Brotherhood convoy to catch."

(Break)

The hyperspace reversion alarm echoed through the 'Peace and Unity's' main hangar as Colonel Bromley fired up the engines of his Wraith starfighter. The hangar doors heaved open and the signal light on each side of the massive doors turned green, Bromley activated retracted his Wraith's landing gear and coasted out of the hangar. His squadron split up into four fighter groups and spread out around the lumbering gray hull of the carrier, providing escort as it passed through the empty space separating the hyperspace jump point from the edges of the Brotherhood armada. Beyond the swarms of gray warships the enemy capitol world of Corneria hung in the distance, its surface bathed in lush green and blue and for a moment Bromley had to stop and admire the planet's beauty. As the planet continued on its rotation the green and blue surface was suddenly marred by a large dark gray spot, the series of war zones down on the surface spewing massive amounts of smoke into the air. Bromley brought his mind back onto the task at hand and maneuvered his fighter into formation.

(Break)

Bill raised his sniper rifle into position and brought its scope to his face. Coming up the street was a long column of Brotherhood vehicles, supply trucks, Armored Personal Carriers, and several Infantry Fighting Vehicles. The canine pilot raised his comlink to his face.

"McCloud the convoy is inbound get ready."

(Break)

Fox acknowledged Bill's message with a double click.

"Here they come."

The vulpine mercenary tensed and gave the signal to his comrades as the ground around him began to shake, Krystal, Wolf, Stevenson, and Falco nodded in acknowledgement. To minimize the risks of being detected and caught in a difficult spot the team had split into two groups and would stow away on separate convoys. The Brotherhood convey came rumbling up the street and came to a stop. Fox peaked out from his hiding place as three Brotherhood soldiers hopped down from the top of an APC, their gray uniforms and composite body armor nearly the same shade as the large concrete pillar that had 'fallen' across the road. The soldiers conversed among themselves for a moment before one of them walked over to the APC and returned carrying two heavy bags. As the soldiers opened the bags and removed several gray, brick shaped objects Fox gave the signal and darted across the few meters that separated his hiding place from the undercarriage of the last vehicle in the column, an APC that sported a wicked looking quad gun mounted near the front of the vehicle. As he slid under the vehicle Krystal and Stevenson joined him while Bill, Wolf, and Falco hid under the supply truck that was second to last in line. Fox pulled several straps ending in magnetic clamps from his pack and proceeded to strap himself to the undercarriage of the APC as Krystal and Stevenson secured their own straps. A high pitched rattling echoed up from the front of the column as the Brotherhood soldiers dismantled the concrete column with some kind of sonic breaching charge, a few moments later a heavy rumble shook through the column of vehicles as the drivers revved up the engine again. Fox gritted his teeth as the vehicle started moving again, another step of the plan had gone off without incident but he couldn't help but wonder how long their luck would last.


End file.
